Please join us for a special virtual event on April 1 at 6pm. Bill Hammond (AB '83) will discuss the scandal over coronavirus deaths in New York nursing homes and his role in ending a cover-up by Governor Cuomo.
It was Hammond's August 2020 Freedom of Information request – and a subsequent lawsuit by his employer, the Empire Center – that in February forced the state Health Department to release complete data on pandemic mortality in long-term care facilities.
Hammond has since used that data to shed new light on how the pandemic unfolded in nursing homes, including the harm caused by the Cuomo administration's policy compelling nursing homes to admit COVID-positive patients after discharge from hospitals.
Before joining the Empire Center in 2016, he spent almost three decades in newspaper journalism, including 17 years covering the state Capitol in Albany. Most recently, he was a columnist and editorial board member at the New York Daily News from 2005 to 2015. He previously wrote for The New York Sun, The Daily Gazette of Schenectady and The Post-Star of Glens Falls. His work has also appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, and the Albany Times Union.
The zoom link will be emailed to the Club shortly. I hope you will join us next week for this timely event.