A healthier economy
Count us pleased that New York City and State are partnering with CUNY to build a huge new East Side hub to train New Yorkers of all backgrounds for jobs in medicine, nursing and research that, in sickness and in health, will be a big part of the city’s future. Count us equally pleased that Gov. Hochul has just announced plans to double state investment in a program to diversify the medical workforce, putting her weight behind a valuable initiative that’s been endangered in multiple budgets.
As the pandemic painfully reminded us, New Yorkers have vastly disparate access to treatment based on race and ethnicity. One of the keys to changing that is opening up care professions to people who even today find themselves on the outside looking in.
The $1.6 billion, 1.5 million square foot life sciences center dubbed SPARC Kips Bay, plans for which were unveiled with a splash on Thursday, will not only house Hunter College’s nursing school, along with CUNY graduate students in public health and health policy and students from
Borough of Manhattan Community College. A public high school will enable kids a chance to explore health and science careers, and there’ll be incubator space for companies, a new facility for the city medical examiner and a half-dozen other uses. Voila, the beating heart of a new medical ecosystem.
As they champion these plans, Hochul and Mayor Adams should explain what’s happening with the Upper East Side site of a long-planned, long-stalled, now-not-gonna-happen Hunter nursing school next to Memorial Sloan Kettering. How will the pricey plot be put to optimal use? Where will Hunter students who dorm in the to-be-demolished Brookdale Campus in Kips Bay go?
New York’s long-term economic success will ultimately depend upon private businesses deciding whether to bet on the city’s future. But in health care especially, government has an outsize role to play in creating the conditions for growth. Adams and Hochul made it likelier that we’ll remain a life-sciences leader, and that communities traditionally left behind will be at the forefront.