A Florida investment firm is seeking a bankruptcy court’s approval to take control of the closed Ellwood City Medical Center in Lawrence County, Pa., the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported. With the medical center’s assets going up for sale within a month, attorneys for West Palm Beach-based Third Friday Total Return Fund yesterday asked the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky to schedule a hearing on its plan to take control of the Ellwood City Hospital parent, Americore Holdings, LLC, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Third Friday’s filing proposes to consolidate Americore’s debts but offers no details on its plans for Ellwood City Medical Center, and manager Mike Lewitt declined to comment yesterday. Earlier this spring, Lewitt told the Ellwood City Ledger newspaper he was committed to reopening the medical center, including its emergency department — a long-sought goal of Ellwood City leaders. Third Friday is already a major investor in Americore, a small, for-profit network of rural, financially stressed hospitals under CEO Grant White. At one point, Americore’s holdings comprised five hospitals, most based in the south, but court filings say that has been reduced to two hospitals and the now-closed Ellwood City Medical Center, which it acquired in 2017. Americore filed for bankruptcy in the Eastern Kentucky court on Dec. 31, a filing which now includes more than 600 filings for its various hospital properties. Among those filings are lien claims by both Ellwood City Borough and the Ellwood City School District against the medical center’s property for unpaid taxes and utility bills.
