Hospitals to disclose environmental violations

Caritas Christi Health Care -- New England's second largest healthcare system -- has agreed to carry out a comprehensive environmental review at 66 facilities in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, and to report any violations to the US Environmental Protection Agency under a broad federal crackdown on pollution coming from hospitals, labs and other healthcare facilities.

Though hospitals don't call to mind traditional images of pollution like belching smokestacks, they account for 1 percent of the nation's solid waste and dispose of potentially deadly chemicals such as mercury and dioxin.

New England EPA Administrator Robert W. Varney warned 250 hospitals in the region last year that his office would be stepping up enforcement on the healthcare industry, prompting voluntary environmental review agreements with several hospitals, including St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center in Boston and Portsmouth Regional Hospital in New Hampshire.

Under the agreement with the EPA, Caritas Christi will inspect its hospitals in Boston, Fall River, Norwood, Dorchester, Methuen and Brockton as well as affiliated doctors' practices, labs and Caritas Laboure College over the next two years. The hospital promises to report any violations of state or federal environmental law to the EPA and correct them within 60 days -- immediately if inspectors discover an imminent health threat.

''Caritas Christi should be applauded for embracing a proactive approach to complying with environmental laws," Varney stated in a release last week.

Woods Hole Research Center replaces its founder
John Holdren of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government last week became only the second director in the 20-year history of the Woods Hole Research Center in Woods Hole, an influential environmental research group that specializes in preserving forested regions such as the Amazon River basin in Brazil. Holdren, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Kennedy School, is known to the 45 staff members because he's been a visiting scientist and trustee there since 1991. He succeeds the center's founder, George M. Woodwell, an ecologist who published more than 300 papers. Woodwell will become the center's senior scientist.
SCOTT ALLEN

Boston Medical doctorleaves to run his own place
Dr. John Chessare, a senior vice president and chief medical officer at Boston Medical Center for seven years, has surprised his colleagues by resigning to take a job running a small community hospital. Chessare, 53, will become chief administrative officer of Caritas Norwood Hospital, the Catholic hospital south of Boston, on June 15. If he meets certain performance goals over the summer, Chessare will be appointed president of the hospital in the fall. ''My dream has been to run my own place," he said. ''A lot of people think I'm crazy. Colleagues have asked why I'm doing this, since I love academic medicine. But Caritas is giving me a chance."
LIZ KOWALCZYK