Non-Profit Hospitals and Property Taxes

A Billion Dollars of Real Community Benefits Dwarf Theoretical Taxes

MADISON (May 16, 2008) ----- A union-backed issues group has released a statement suggesting that Wisconsin’s non-profit hospitals should ante up at least $117 million in property taxes, saying that these charitable organizations “are indistinguishable…from for-profit hospitals.” The Institute for Wisconsin’s Future (IWF) states that others must “pay the hospital’s share.” But their narrow analysis fails to consider the significant contribution our non-profit hospitals make to their communities.

The reality is that Wisconsin’s non-profit hospitals provide over $1 billion in community benefits, or ten times the amount that IWF says could theoretically be collected in property taxes. Of that total, $182 million is charity care provided to those who cannot afford to pay for the services they receive. That alone exceeds any property taxes that might be paid – but there is much more. Over half a billion dollars of Medicaid payment shortfalls were absorbed. For-profit hospitals have no obligation to serve Medicaid patients. Non-profit hospitals serve all patients, regardless of their source of payment. And there is still more to talk about.

Wisconsin’s non-profit hospitals provide hundreds of programs, services, and activities to thousands of individuals costing hundreds of millions of dollars, solely because those programs fulfill a health need in the community.

According to the 2006 WHA Community Benefits Report, hospitals sponsored more than six million community education and outreach services on topics ranging from asthma education to women’s health, spending more than $63 million on those activities. More than 225,000 people participated in health screenings. Hospitals underwrote nearly $9 million and logged more than 67,000 visits at free and reduced fee clinics. Other services included health professions education, research, and community building activities. In all, Wisconsin’s non-profit hospitals spent almost $250 million on these community benefit activities.

“Whether it is providing financial assistance to patients with limited resources through charity care programs, or improving the access to essential or preventive health care services by sponsoring free clinics and health screenings, hospitals fulfill their missions by helping people live safer and healthier lives,” said Wisconsin Hospital Association Senior Vice President George Quinn. “It should be clear that we more than fulfill our charitable obligations – our efforts greatly enhance the well-being of our communities.”

To learn more about the community benefit programs and other health services hospitals provide, please refer to the Web site www.WIServePoint.org.