OPINION: Ownership matters: Saving Greenwood Leflore Hospital
By Dr. Curressia
McFarland Brown
JA Guest Writer
Let me be absolutely clear: I have full confidence in the capacity of the University of Mississippi Medical Center to deliver patient-centered care, clinical excellence, and advanced treatment to the Mississippi Delta. That is not what concerns me when it comes to Greenwood Leflore Hospital. My concern (and what I believe should be the concern of every person in Greenwood and Leflore County) is what we are being asked to give up in order to get it. Help should never require surrender.
Now, where do we stand?
I am not convinced that we have to surrender ownership to keep the hospital open – not in the heart of the Mississippi Delta, a region that depends on it for survival. And that’s not just emotion, that’s based on what we know. Look at what surrounds Greenwood Leflore Hospital: Viking, Staplcotn, Mississippi Valley State University, catfish plants, farmers, small businesses, and a population of roughly 25,000 people in Leflore County alone who rely on access to care. That is not incidental. That is an ecosystem. It is economic and public health interdependence.
When you layer on the data, the documented reality that Leflore County has experienced some of the highest per capita rates of gun deaths and gun homicides in the nation (Greenwood Commonwealth, April 22, 2026), you begin to understand the stakes in real terms. This is not abstract. This is about trauma care, emergency response times, and whether people live or die.
Calling this hospital a “critical facility” is not enough. It is essential to life in this community.
Even the Governor’s Office acknowledges that strengthening healthcare in rural communities creates a lasting impact on Mississippi’s overall health infrastructure – an acknowledgement that has also been offered as a policy direction. And we know that the governor has approximately $205.9 million in available resources to support rural healthcare stabilization.
If the need is documented, the impact is understood, and the resources are available, why are we being told that loss of ownership is the price of survival? GLH is not just a building sitting on a corner. It is a lifeline. It is infrastructure. It is survival.
What do we hear from leadership? In some cases, silence, and in other cases, “No comment.” There are a few questions that deserve an answer. A good place to start is, “What forecast, what data, what analysis supports a bright and thriving future for North Sunflower Medical Center on Greenwood’s Park Avenue while projecting instability or decline for Greenwood Leflore Hospital?” When you line those two narratives up, side by side, they don’t reconcile. Simply put, “the math isn’t mathing.” What it suggests is that conversations are happening behind closed doors, and decisions – maybe even deals – are being made about our lives without our input.
I support UMMC stepping in to manage the operations of this hospital. We need stability. We need expertise. We need help now. But I do not accept the idea that help must come at the price of surrender. If the deal on the table requires this community to give up ownership, then we must pause. At a minimum, we should be informed, and at best, we should be involved. Transparency is not optional. Transparency is fundamental to public trust and sound decision-making.
It is true that GLH did not arrive at its current condition overnight. There have been poor financial decisions, poor personnel decisions, and failures in leadership and accountability that are documented in both experience and outcome. Here is what is equally true: We do not fix past mistakes by giving away our future.
Partnership must be the path forward, and it must be structured in a way that protects both access and ownership. Give UMMC full operational authority if that is what it takes. Establish long-term agreements – 50 years, 100 years – whatever ensures stability and sustainability. But do so with the understanding that ownership matters. Ownership is voice. Once that voice is gone, decisions about our healthcare, our families, and our future will be made in Jackson.
Loss of ownership does not eliminate the risk of closure, merger, or service reduction. It simply removes our ability to influence those outcomes. Right now, we do not know what is being discussed behind closed doors. If some do know – if there are individuals within this community with access to that information, why isn’t that information being shared with all stakeholders?
The governor has both the authority and the stated commitment to strengthen rural healthcare, and resources are available to do so. This means there is a path forward that does not require the City of Greenwood and Leflore County to surrender ownership. There is a way to stabilize operations and preserve access to healthcare.
We have seen what happens when communities are excluded from decision-making. We have watched similar patterns play out across this state in the form of battles over infrastructure, governance, and institutional control – over an airport and funding for a public water system.
While we are focused on the hospital, another decision (just as consequential) is moving through the same system of power. That decision is one that ought to sound an alarm on the campus of Mississippi Valley State University and be a clarion call to every alum, administrator, faculty, staff and student – a call we would be dangerously naïve to ignore.
Earlier this session, Senate Bill 2523 proposed a new funding model for higher education, one that ties state dollars to outcomes like graduation rates and post-graduation employment. On paper, it sounds reasonable. In practice, it is a formula that punishes institutions like Mississippi Valley State University, institutions that serve students who come with greater financial need, greater barriers, and fewer inherited advantages. Measuring these institutions by the same metrics as well-resourced universities, without acknowledging those disparities, is not fair. It is erasure. Though the bill did not advance this session, let’s not mistake its failure for protection. It didn’t stall because of a moral awakening or desire to see MVSU thrive, it stalled because of timing. According to House committee Chairman Rep. Donnie Scoggin (Republican) “consolidation is not off the table.”
What is most troubling in this moment regarding GLH is not just the situation but the lack of transparency and accountability surrounding it. We have learned more about the direction of this hospital from senators outside of this district than from the senators elected to represent it. This is not about partisanship, or is it? When this hospital is impacted, every single one of us is impacted regardless of race, income, or political affiliation. However, it is an undisputed fact that the decisions shaping this moment are being made by the party currently holding legislative and executive authority in our state.
When legislation is introduced (without meaningful community input) that opens the door to outcomes as significant as loss of ownership, we have not only a right but a responsibility to ask: Why? Why were these decisions made without broader community engagement?
Who was consulted? Who was not? Whose voice is being represented in these decisions?
Current healthcare workers want to know if their pensions are protected. Staffers are concerned whether they will be next on the list of permanent layoffs. Patients want to know if their insurance will still be accepted. The community wants to know whether the services they rely on will be the next services eliminated. Was consideration given to any of these questions? If we were assured of that, it would have signaled that we are valued as constituents.
If “the community” is being cited as a participant in this process, then it is fair to ask: Which community?
Author and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston reminds us, “If you are silent about your pain, they’ll kill you and say you enjoyed it.” Civil Rights Activist Fannie Lou Hamer declared, “If you don’t speak out ain’t nobody going to speak out for you.” It is time that decision makers acknowledge the voices of those who have been left out – by design or by default.
At the end of the day, this is not just about a hospital. It is about governance and representation. It is about whether the people of the Mississippi Delta will have a meaningful role in shaping their own future. It is about our health, our economy, and our dignity. It is a matter of life and death.
And yes, it is about our right to hold on to what is ours. God bless the child that’s got his own.
