Court ruling stops Cold Spring Hills Center for Nursing & Rehabilitation from 'emergency evacuation' of residents

A Nassau judge Friday granted a temporary restraining order sought by the New York Attorney General's Office blocking Cold Spring Hills Center for Nursing & Rehabilitation from beginning the immediate "emergency evacuation" of 318 elderly and disabled resident days before Christmas and Hanukkah.

State Supreme Court Justice Lisa Cairo's ruling after two days of arguments in her Mineola courtroom prevents the Woodbury nursing home from discharging or transferring its residents until both sides return to court on Jan. 6.

The order also requires Cold Spring Hills, Long Island's second largest nursing home, to continue meeting its weekly payroll obligations until at least Jan. 6.

The nursing home informed its hundreds of staff members this week that layoffs of some employees would begin on Dec. 23, with the remaining employees slated to lose their jobs once the last resident had been evacuated.

Cold Spring Hills had planned to close its doors on Dec. 31 but now must remain open for at least two-and-a-half weeks.

"Today’s decision allows the dedicated nursing home staff to continue providing care to the residents of Cold Spring Hills through the holidays and into the new year," said George Gresham, president of 1199SEIU, the union representing most of the nursing home employees. "But hundreds of residents and their families deserve a long-term solution to this situation." 

In court Friday, Alee Scott, chief of the Civil Enforcement Division of the state attorney general's Medicare Fraud Control Unit, said nursing home magnate Bent Philipson, Cold Spring Hills' primary owner, and his son, Avi Philipson, the business' managing member, made the "unilateral, unapproved and illegal decision" to evacuate residents because they no longer want to pay their workers.

"And this is wrong. And it is illegal. And it is despicable that Cold Spring Hills ... would claim a right that does not exist anywhere in the laws, in the guidance, in the statutes, anywhere in humanity," Scott added. "They would claim a right to evacuate 300 people from their home involuntarily right before the holidays because they don't want to pay the wages. The Philipson family wants to protect their very substantial financial resources."

But Paul Kremer, an attorney for Cold Spring Hills, argued repeatedly in court this week that the nursing home doesn't have the resources to meet the $1.14 million weekly payroll and that there were no legal grounds for the judge to grant the temporary restraining order.

"There are no legal statutory, regulatory, not even agency guidance basis to require the Philipsons to fund this entity, to pay payroll on behalf of the entity, or to prohibit or restrain the facility from doing what the facility, in its judgment, as a licensed provider, has decided is what's best for its residents," Kremer told the judge.

In December 2022, the state attorney general's office filed suit against the nursing home, charging the facility neglected resident care and skirted state laws through a fraudulent business setup designed to enrich its owners.

In April, Cairo appointed an independent health monitor for the facility and imposed a $2 million penalty as part of the resolution of the lawsuit.

By Robert Brodsky

robert.brodsky@newsday.com@BrodskyRobert

Robert Brodsky is a breaking news reporter who has worked at Newsday since 2011. He is a Queens College and American University alum.