ROUND LAKE, Ill., June 5
/PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A controversy that
has rocked Advocate Health Care elsewhere in the
Chicago region spread to Lake County Tuesday
when a coalition of city-based religious and
neighborhood groups charged that the company's
bid to build a hospital in Round Lake would
deepen racial divisions.
More than 50 representatives of the Coalition
to Save Community Hospitals (CSCH) traveled to
Round Lake to express their opposition to the
proposed $240 million hospital during a public
hearing held by the Illinois Health Facilities
Planning Board (IHFPB). The groups, which have
derailed other Advocate projects throughout the
region, charge that the company has consistently
neglected its hospitals serving minority
communities, even as it continues aggressive
expansion into predominantly white outlying
suburbs.
While Advocate bills itself as a
"faith-based" system with a heritage of serving
the poor, 89 percent of its capital resources
have been allocated to its four hospitals
serving mostly affluent suburban communities,
according to records filed with the IHFPB
between 1995 - when Advocate was formed - and
2005. Meanwhile, since 2002, the company has
closed two of its four hospitals treating mostly
minority, lower-income areas in the city and
neighboring suburbs.
As a non-profit hospital system, Advocate
collects $80 million in tax exemptions from
local and state governments, according to a 2006
study by the Center for Tax and Budget
Accountability. In exchange for these subsidies,
the company is obligated to provide discounted
care to the poor and uninsured - a
responsibility that Advocate is shirking by
withdrawing resources from the low-income
neighborhoods. Meanwhile, the company has
amassed more than $3 billion in assets.
"For many years now, Advocate has pursued a
policy of medical white flight," said Rev. Robin
Hood of the Association of Community
Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN). "The
numbers don't lie: if you are poor and minority,
you are going to receive an inferior level of
care at an Advocate Hospital. The IHFPB should
withhold approval for a new hospital in Round
Lake until Advocate restores equal services for
all communities."
Several state legislators have sent comments
to regulators urging them to deny Advocate's
Round Lake proposal, including Illinois Reps.
Annazette Collins (D-Chicago), Marlow Colvin
(D-Chicago), Mary Flowers (D-Chicago) and Karen
Yarborough (D-Chicago).
Advocate encountered its fiercest opposition
last year when it attempted to eliminate core
services at Bethany Hospital on Chicago's West
Side. Religious and community groups packed
public meetings, garnered support from Chicago
elected officials and state legislators, and
ultimately compelled the IHFPB to temporarily
pull the plug on the service cuts.
In that decision, the board chastised the
company for straying from its non-profit mission
to care for the poor. IHFPB Board Chair Susanna
Lopatka said, "Everything in me cries against
what I perceive as a stepping away -
particularly for a system with the history that
Advocate has - a stepping away from the needs of
the disadvantaged. And who is going to pick up
the slack? The public sector cannot do it all."
The coalition argues that Advocate is that
retreat by vying to build a new hospital in Lake
County less than one year after it cut services
at Bethany.
"For the thousands of patients who depended
on Bethany Hospital, this proposal to expand in
Round Lake adds insult to injury," said Ed
Shurna, Executive Director of the Chicago
Coalition for the Homeless. "Advocate is
suffering from the corporate equivalent of heart
failure."
The Coalition to Save Community Hospitals
includes ACORN, Albany Park Neighborhood
Council, Chicago Coalition for the Homeless,
Service Employees International Union, South
Austin Coalition and Target Area Development
Corporation.
CONTACT: Mike Truppa (312) 408-2580,
x-12 Ambar Mentor (312) 408-2580, x-25
Coalition to Save Community
Hospitals
