BEVERLY — Organizers of a campaign to save the North Shore Birth Center are planning a large rally tomorrow morning — when the Northeast Health System board of trustees will meet to discuss a proposal to stop allowing births at the center.
They're expecting not just mothers, but hundreds of husbands and fathers, children and friends, who will hold picket signs on Herrick Street and wind up the driveway of the Beverly Hospital entrance at 6:30 a.m., before the 7 a.m meeting, organizers said.
"We're trying to get people out so that way when the trustees are coming into the hospital entrance, they'll see us there," Christa Terry said. She's expecting in March, and wants to give birth at the center.
The North Shore Birth Center is tailored to women with low-risk pregnancies who want to give birth naturally, with no drugs, in a quiet, private setting.
More than a week ago, the board of trustees of Northeast Health System — which owns Beverly Hospital and the birth center — released a statement saying the birth center is "experiencing a significant rise in the cost of malpractice insurance premiums ... and currently evaluating the services provided."
Hospital spokeswoman Erin Doyle said the hospital has nothing further to add to its previous statement.
Rebecca Hains, a mother who started a Facebook group online that now has 500 members working to save the center, said on Wednesday she spoke with trustee chairwoman Nancy Palmer and requested the board meet with the grassroots organization, and postpone its decision.
"She basically said all the board members were quite busy, and meetings with the community are not normal," Hains said. "We're very concerned they don't seem willing to meet with us."
Hains said Palmer also told her there were no guarantees the board would make a decision on Tuesday. The request to postpone the decision was reiterated in a formal letter to trustees.
"Considering the ramifications your decision will have on the region for years and years to come, we deserve more time to ensure that our perspective is not just considered, but fully and thoughtfully deliberated upon by the board of trustees," the letter from the Campaign to Save the Birth Center reads.
Hundreds of other people also sent personal letters to trustees about why they feel the center should remain open.
"I think they're overwhelmed," Hains said.
She said the trustees should take the time to read through all the letters, listen to medical experts advocating for natural births that "have come out of the woodwork" Hains said, and hold off on a decision until the new administration has a chance to settle in.
Beverly Hospital Executive Director Stephen Laverty resigned on Wednesday, and Dr. Henry J. Ramini, a retired physician and former chairman of the hospital board of trustees, was appointed to serve as the interim CEO.
Ramini, an obstetrician who delivered 5,280 babies during nearly 50 years at the hospital, strongly supported the creation of the birth center when it opened in 1980. It's the first freestanding birth center in the Northeast, and nearly 100 babies a year are born there. The only other center in the state is in Cambridge.
"We want to talk to the new CEO," Hains said. "We feel like the change in personnel could really have a positive influence on the community's perspective about this decision."
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