Sacramento, CA — A bill authored by Assemblymember Mike A. Gipson that seeks to ease pressure on overcrowded hospital emergency departments, including Martin Luther King Jr. Community Hospital in South Los Angeles, has cleared the California Legislature and is headed to Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Assembly Bill 2405 would establish a more consistent statewide standard governing where law enforcement officers transport certain individuals requiring emergency medical care, including people detained for mental health evaluation.

Under the measure, law enforcement agencies transporting a person to an emergency department would generally be required to take the individual to the nearest appropriate emergency department, subject to exceptions outlined in the legislation.

Gipson, whose 65th Assembly District includes Carson, Compton, Watts, Willowbrook, Wilmington, Harbor City, San Pedro and portions of Long Beach, said the legislation is intended to improve patient care while distributing emergency room demand more equitably among hospitals.

“Today, inconsistent law enforcement transport practices contribute to overcrowding, delays in care, and inequitable distribution of patients across hospital ERs,” Gipson said. “This is particularly burdensome for safety-net facilities with scarce resources.”

The legislation has particular significance for Martin Luther King Jr. Community Hospital in Willowbrook, where officials have spent years sounding the alarm over extraordinary demand on its emergency department.

The nonprofit hospital opened in 2015 with an emergency department designed to accommodate approximately 25,000 visits annually. Today, it is treating roughly 125,000 emergency patients each year — about five times its intended volume.

The hospital serves one of Los Angeles County’s most medically underserved communities. Approximately 80% of its patients are covered by Medi-Cal, while nearly 95% of emergency department visits involve Medi-Cal or Medicare patients or people who are uninsured.

Hospital officials have said the demand has grown so severe that patients have at times been triaged and treated in temporary tents outside the hospital.

The effort to relieve that pressure received a major boost in August when Kaiser Permanente announced an investment of up to $32 million to help expand MLK Community Hospital’s Hope Emergency Center.

The commitment includes a $25 million grant along with the purchase and loan of modular building capacity valued at up to $7 million. The modular facility will provide additional treatment space while the hospital moves forward with a permanent expansion of its emergency department.

Kaiser described the commitment as an investment in the broader health care infrastructure serving South Los Angeles.

“This is about more than expanding an emergency department. It is about strengthening the health care infrastructure that Los Angeles families depend on today and will continue to rely on for generations to come,” Kaiser Permanente Chairman and CEO Greg A. Adams said when the investment was announced.

MLK Community Healthcare CEO Dr. Elaine Batchlor said AB 2405 addresses another piece of the hospital’s capacity challenge by establishing clearer standards for where patients are transported.

“The standards that AB 2405 lays out would ensure that patients experiencing psychiatric distress are able to get the care that they need more quickly and in their own communities,” Batchlor said. “AB 2405 would also ensure that the burden of caring for these patients is more broadly and equitably shared among hospitals.”

Gipson said the legislation recognizes both the needs of vulnerable patients and the importance of protecting safety-net hospitals that often operate with significantly fewer resources.

“It’s in the best interest of vulnerable patients getting emergency care to travel to the closest doctor who can help,” Gipson said. “This bill preserves the community hospitals that serve as pillars of strength in Assembly Districts like mine, and I urge Governor Newsom to sign it into law.”

The Legislature’s passage of AB 2405 comes amid broader concerns about the financial sustainability of MLK Community Hospital and other safety-net providers.

For residents of Gipson’s district, the issue extends beyond the walls of a single hospital. MLK Community Hospital serves a predominantly Medi-Cal, Medicare and uninsured population in communities that have historically faced shortages in primary, specialty and emergency medical care.

If signed by Newsom, AB 2405 would add a statewide transportation requirement intended to make the distribution of emergency patients more consistent while helping ensure people experiencing a crisis are taken to an appropriate nearby facility.