Related: Why the Nation Doesn't Need Massachusetts Health Care
Massachusetts Health Care Takes a Seat on the S***ter
The Massachusetts Model
The Hot Fart Mist of Ted Kennedy
I want Sicko now more than ever.
"Hospitals, firms in healthcare back Kennedy institute" by Matt Viser, Globe Staff | January 20, 2009
Drug companies, hospitals, and insurance firms have helped to amass $20 million to finance a nonprofit educational institute in Boston that will honor Senator Edward M. Kennedy, using his career as a case study of a powerful senator.
The biggest donation has been $5 million from
Other large donors have been Partners Healthcare, the Boston nonprofit corporation that is the umbrella for Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital, with a gift of $1 million. The Dana- Farber Cancer Institute contributed $1 million. Kennedy's influence in Washington has been crucial for those institutions and other university-affiliated hospitals in Boston that rely heavily on research funding, as well as reimbursement policies.
So Partners rigging the billing system for overpayments is what you have coming at you, America!
Kennedy friends and former staffers formed the nonprofit organization, the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate, and launched an aggressive fund-raising campaign four months ago, spearheaded by prominent Boston businessman Jack Connors, who is chairman of Partners.
Oh, GREAT!!!
The goal is to erect a new building, complete with a replica of the US Senate chamber, on a 4-acre plot on Columbia Point in Boston that is owned by the University of Massachusetts, near the John F. Kennedy Library. The institute is expected to include a training program for incoming US senators, mock US Senate sessions for students, and museum space that will showcase excerpts from US Senate speeches and debates....
Because the corporations and nonprofits making large contributions have significant interests in federal policies, the effort requires Kennedy's supporters to walk a delicate line as they help his cause. Kennedy has long been a major healthcare advocate and is currently laying the groundwork for major healthcare changes as chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee....
The Service Employees International Union gave $2.5 million, and the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America pledged $1 million. The
Several major law firms have also pledged $1 million, including the firm of Peter Angelos, who owns the Baltimore Orioles; and Boies, Schiller & Flexner LLP, which counseled Al Gore in the 2000 recount. A portion of the money was raised during a November dinner in Boston, where nearly 500 people attending heard Phillip Sharp, a Nobel laureate scientist from MIT, talked about contributions Kennedy has made to the biomedical industry....
Connors said the group seeks to raise $80 million more this year and plans to host dinners in Washington; New York, to target the financial industry; and on the West Coast, to raise money from entertainment executives....
Oh, so BAILOUT $ is going to be used to fund Ted's foundation?
Aaaaaaaaahhhh!!!
The institute is searching for a chief executive, and a website will be launched next month. An advisory council is being established and will be chaired by two former senators, John Warner, a Virginia Republican, and Jim Sasser, a Tennessee Democrat.
UMass is planning to issue a bond for the building, which is expected to cost $40 million to $50 million. Connors is hoping to raise a total of $100 million that will be used for an endowment to fund operations at the institute, as well as to pay down the debt on the bond used to build it.
Yup BORROW, BORROW, BORROW!!!
Planners have started searching for an architect to design the building and intend to choose a firm by next month. They are hoping to break ground on a building later this year that will be on par with the presidential library next door.
"When people drive up they ought to see two brothers standing together," Connors said. "It ought not be diminished in size compared to the JFK presidential library."
I'm sorry, but no way can Ted stand next to his brother. We all know why he was killed, and why Ted survived.
Oh, and about those NON-PROFIT HOSPITALS!!!
"Hospitals not paying fair share, group says" by Scott Allen, Globe Staff | January 21, 2009
Boston's major hospitals could and should play a significant role in easing the city's budget crisis, according to a new report by an advocacy group finding that the institutions pay only a fraction of the cost of providing police, fire, and other services to the $2.4 billion in property the tax-exempt charities own.
So Madoff's charities weren't paying taxes, either, huh?
Community Labor United, a coalition of union and activist groups, found that the city's eight biggest teaching hospitals would have owed $64.2 million in city taxes in 2007 if their land and buildings had been taxed like commercial property. Instead, the hospitals made voluntary payments to the city of just $4 million in 2007, a year when they collectively had profits of more than $750 million.
Hey, TAXES are only for YOU, nothing citizen!!!
I wish mine were "VOLUNTARY!"
"They're not paying their fair share," said Mary Jo Connelly, director of research for Community Labor United, whose members include a union seeking to organize city hospital workers. "In a time that everyone is sacrificing, it's time for them to step up and start addressing these shortfalls. We know there are going to be significant layoffs of teachers, police, Fire Department personnel, and that sort of thing. If they paid only 25 percent [of the property tax rate], we could save 115 firefighters" from layoff.
What else is new?
But hospital officials contend that Community Labor United greatly underestimated how much the teaching hospitals already contribute to the city, including $175 million in community programs last year such as clinics that serve low-income patients. In addition, the hospitals attract more than $1 billion a year in federal research money and provide free care to people who cannot pay on their own.
Yeah, you guys are great.
"I would argue that these community benefit programs are filling a void that the city would otherwise have to," said John Erwin, executive director of the Conference of Boston Teaching Hospitals, which represents about a dozen medical centers.
Which they could if they had the tax money.
The report, "The Non-Profit City," was released as government revenues are plummeting due to the economic downturn and as Boston politicians look for ways to generate more income from hospitals, universities and other tax-exempt institutions that collectively own more than half the property in Boston.
Hey, WE are getting a GAS TAX INCREASE and a PROPERTY TAX INCREASE and a TOLL INCREASE and a .... in other words, welcome into the pool!
Mayor Thomas M. Menino, who has said the city faces a $140 million budget shortfall, announced last month that he is forming a task force aimed at increasing the voluntary payments by hospitals and universities, called "payments in lieu of taxes," or PILOTs....
How do I qualify for that program (as I flip 'em a nickel)?
Under state law, the city cannot force nonprofit hospitals to pay property tax, but for decades Boston has negotiated voluntary payments from hospitals, often in exchange for approval of expansion or construction plans. City officials have argued that hospitals should pay at least 25 percent of the property tax rate to cover the cost of providing city services.
Hospitals vary enormously in the payments they make, ranging from several hospitals that paid 2 percent or less of the commercial property tax rate to Brigham and Women's Hospital, which pays 26 percent of the commercial rate. Altogether, the teaching hospitals made payments equal to 6 percent of the commercial tax rate, Community Labor calculated, far below the city's 25 percent goal.
Councilor Stephen J. Murphy, who for six years has pushed to have nonprofit institutions pay more into city coffers, said he welcomed the support of Community Labor. He said that several members of the City Council have strongly backed his efforts, but that he has struggled to build broader support outside council chambers....
Translation: powerful special interests are opposed -- so nothing gets done.
But hospital officials said that now is not a good time to ask more from the hospitals, which have problems of their own. Through the first three quarters of 2008, the eight hospitals analyzed in the report have seen profits drop by more than 50 percent, according to state figures.
And THAT is the PROBLEM!! We need to take the "PROFIT" out of health care!!
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