Illinois Supreme Court rules Provena must pay tax

[AngryAmish]

Source: Chicago Tribune

The Illinois Supreme Court ruled this morning that Provena Covenant Medical Center in Urbana did not provide enough charity care to qualify for a property tax exemption.

The widely watched ruling, which rejected the Catholic hospital's appeal of a tax review board decision to take away its tax exempt status in 2003, could set the stage for charity care expectations at hospitals around the county.

The ruling in effect means the hospital will have to begin paying property taxes. It has been considered a nonprofit hospital like most hospitals in the U.S. that are exempt from state property taxes.
The Illinois Supreme Court upheld a lower court's decision in the landmark case that pitted Provena Covenant Medical Center against the Illinois Department of Revenue. The revenue department argued Provena should not be exempt from paying property taxes in 2002 when the state said the medical center's charity care was less than 1 percent of revenue.

Read more: http://www.chicagobreakingbusiness.com/2010/03/illinois-supreme-court-to-rule-today-on-provena-hospital-charity-care.html

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This is good news. Most "charity" hospitals are charities in name only. They exist to make the doctors, administrators, nurses et al money. It screws the taxpayers over because they gain huge swaths of land in a town or county, suck services dry and provide little charity.

Let's start looking at all these places.

[Catshrink]

1. And look at churches that politick

[jody]

2. Legislators should have set the standard not leave it to the court. What states have laws re amount

of charity care to remain a non-profit hospital?

[AngryAmish]

3. Really?

Give away a penny and pay the administrators $1,000,000 annually and that is ok? THat is not ok, that is called a scam.

[jody]

4. Apparently you misunderstood my post. I support the decision, just disappointed that the courts had

to do a job that legislators should have done.

[AngryAmish]

6. Fair enough. My fault.

[tavalon]

5. You may not be aware, but nurses make about as much as teachers

There are no nurses in nursing for the money, especially if they work at a catholic hospital, well known for having the lowest wages.

[AngryAmish]

7. Mean RN wages in Chicagoland for nurses is $67,740

http://www.bls.gov/oes/2008/may/oes_16974.htm#b29-0000

Well paid profession. No nurses would take another job if the wages were lower? Really?

Let us not infantilize nurses. They want to maximize wages, minimize hours just like everyone else.

[tavalon]

9. I'm a little too old to infantilize and I know of what I speak

I actually make better wages because I'm in a union, but I worked plenty of years as a nurse in a Catholic Hospital. We don't do it for the love of money. Well, a few are in it for the money but the job is hard and often thankless, so most of us are in it for the love of our fellow man.

[jody]

8. CA nurse earned $270,000 last year. At least one nurse is in it for the money.

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/mar/06/local/la-me-overtime7-2010mar07
QUOTE
Reporting from Sacramento — Like many other state employees, prison nurse Nellie Larot was hit last year with furloughs that cut her salary: It dropped $10,000, to $92,000.

But she more than made up for it by working extra shifts, raking in $177,512 in overtime, according to state records. Her total $270,000 in earnings last year eclipsed the $225,000 paid to Matthew Cate, head of the entire state prison system.
UNQUOTE

[du_grad]

14. Please do not generalize about pay in Catholic hospitals

I am not Catholic. However, I work for a large Catholic hospital. The nurses are unionized and covered by the UAW. My wages as a medical technologist are the highest in our area. I would assume that the nurses are paid equally well. This is not a recent phenomenon. When I graduated back in 1974 from MT school, it was a well known fact that the hospital I work for now (but did not back then) paid higher than anywhere else in town.

Our hospital also gives out the biggest share of charity care in our area. Pre-recession, they gave away $35 Million in unreimbursed care. I know it's way higher now.

[davsand]

18. This ruling only affects hospitals, not the care providers who work there.

This is about corporate profits and hospitals not providing enough in return for that tax exemption.


L.

[tavalon]

19. correct

[greiner3]

10. With half the heads of SCOTUS catholic;

Why do I get the feeling this may be overturned on appeal?

[davsand]

17. Nope. This is Illinois law. Unless it is a federal constitutional issue it is over as of today.

Property tax law is Illinois law. Once the Illinois Supreme Court ruled this debate ended. The only way the feds get a swing at this is if there is some proof that the ruling violated a federal statute.


Laura

[No Elephants]

21. Five of the nine are Catholic-a majority.

[Proletariatprincess]

11. Tax all religious institutions in the USA

Use that revenue to pay for health care for citizens.
Force them to do what they say they care about. At least they would bring some real value to the country instead of just lip service and condemnation of sin.
Religion has had a free ride in our society for too long now. Im so tired of hearing about how they do such good work while the tax dollars that they should be paying go for prosthetizing.

[madrchsod]

13. read why churches are`t taxed in the usa.

contrary to your belief there are religious institutions and their members that have done much to improve the world. many have given their lives to help those who can`t help themselves.oh well i know what i said falls on death ears

[Proletariatprincess]

20. People can do good works without belonging to religious organizations.

Religion does not have a monopoly on good works...or morality.

[No Elephants]

22. I do understand, but political organizations are taxed, even if they do good deeds. .

I have no problem if a church says, "Your religioun denies you the right to an abortion." But, when it says, "Your religion requires you to vote against anyone who vote pro-choice," they've crossed a line. Ditto when they deny communion to people who have never had an abortion, like Kerry and Patrick Kennedy, simply bc they refuse to play God with others or to force every woman in America to live by their Catholic beliefs. Especially when they do not do the same when it comes to war or the death penalty. That goes way beyond pro-life. It becomes, with very few excpetions, anti-Democratic Party, period.

Churches that cross the line will not lose their exemption, because the politicians don't have the courage to do the right and Constitutional thing. But, they should.

[madrchsod]

12. i read about this 2004 in a hospital trade magazine

the article basically said the hospital was going to lose and "charity" hospitals should get their hospitals in order or they will also be sued and lose.

[kevsand]

15. You'll have to forgive me...

...for bragging on my wife. DU's own davsand is the current chair of the Champaign County Board of Review, which initiated this case back in 2003. She researched and wrote significant portions of the original opinion, which has now been upheld by the Illinois Supreme Court. She's too modest to say anything (plus she's at work right now), but we're all pretty proud of her...

[Rosie1223]

16. Good Work, Laura!

:thumbsup:

[No Elephants]

23. Good for your wife--and you, too.

[davsand]

24. This all began as part of what I do routinely in my office, and it can possibly save lives.

As my husband pointed out up-thread, this case originated in my office. I did a lot of the early legal research on it and a fair amount of the writing in the initial filing. I'm obviously pretty jazzed to have anybody at the level of the Illinois Supreme Court tell me I'm right about something, but it really goes a lot deeper than that for me.

When we first looked at this exemption case, I was struck by the small amount of charity care that was being provided (less than ONE percent!) Further, the more I looked at it, I learned that the hospital routinely would mark up the price of service for the uninsured--sometimes two or three times as much! The people who DID manage to get reduced fee care were STILL paying more for it than the people with insurance. Poor people were getting sued--sometimes arrested, even--and this was an institution that claimed a charitable exemption.

Every day in the US people die because they don't or can't seek medical care due to lack of ability to pay. People are forced to try and decide if it is worse to die or go into debt--and quite literally people ARE dying. Institutions that we all support/subsidize with fairly substantial tax exemptions are in a position to help, yet they prey on those same poor people as a matter of standard policy.

Charity Care was a secret that a lot of the time nobody knew anything about. Sometimes, patients might ask about it, but the public awareness was not there, and for sure the local hospital was not making much effort to advertise its availability or even make it accessible. Given the fact that our state laws say that "charitable use" must be the exclusive use of an exempt property, it was impossible to do anything other than challenge that exemption.

We DID challenge it, and we asked some fairly uncomfortable questions. Those questions were problematic enough that the case ended up going on from 2002 up to yesterday's decision.

I'm glad I'm able to say that we got it right. I'm also glad to be able to flip the bird at some of those attorneys who were so awful to deal with. I've been served, sued, and outright harassed at times for doing my job, and never once have I doubted that it was worth it. Awful as it has been at times, I have always held on to the thought that somewhere, someplace in Illinois, there is somebody who is in medical crisis who will maybe seek care now because this case highlighted the fact that hospitals are SUPPOSED to offer free or reduced fee care to the medically indigent.

On a personal note, shortly after this case began we lost a longtime friend because he was medically indigent and he refused to seek care from his local non-profit hospital until it was too late. Similarly, here at DU we all watched in horror as Andy Stephenson fought to get lifesaving surgery and wasted precious time and energy fighting a system that was interested only in his value in dollars and cents. My biggest regret is that Brian and Andy are not here to see this ruling.



Laura

[AngryAmish]

25. Good for you! Someone should buy you a steak (hint).

[davsand]

26. Where you taking me?

I'm downstate and kinda partial to the Beefhouse over in Covington, Indiana. If you are in Chicago I'm betting there are a couple good places for steak there as well--so I'm open to suggestion...

:evilgrin:


(That was me playing, btw)

-------------------------------

We have celebrated this. My family took me out Thursday evening and my husband took me out for dinner and coffees last night while our daughter was at her Jr High dance.

It is almost impossible to put into words just how much this ruling means to me--both on a personal and professional level. I am proud as can be of my family but, this one ruling has a lot of potential to help people. This is why I do what I do for a living.


Laura

[mopinko]

27. wow, thank you laura

du should have some sort of award for members who accomplish this sort of good. just amazing.
and next time you are up this way, i would be proud to take you out for a steak.

now if only we can spread this around. i don't think there is a hospital in chicago that lives up to this obligation with the noted exception of children's memorial.

then we can take up the universities. they are every bit as bad.

[davsand]

28. The Tribune had a chart on the front page of the business section about charity care in Chicago.

We HAD to buy a few papers on Friday just to see all the headlines, of course. The Trib's business section was front page about the issue. They have a chart that gives the percentages of charity care provided by Chicago hospitals. (I'll warn you, it is gonna piss you off when you see it.) The reporter for the Trib GETS it--his name is Bruce Japson and he's one of the good guys out there.

As for the offer of a steak, I'd LOVE to get together with you, but I do not expect you to buy. Just getting to hang with you guys is treat enough.

:hug:


Laura