How “representatives” sell out our most vulnerable citizens.
As a CPA who, for the last decade, has prepared pro bono tax returns for citizens at the Jersey Shore, I’ve seen a lot of suffering: homelessness, unemployment, chronic illnesses, bankruptcies, suffocating student loan debt, unconscionable medical bills, and the scars of incarceration. Many taxpayers are overwhelmed and depressed, resulting from job losses through economic downsizing and privatizing schemes.
They wonder how they’re going to get through the week.
Living paycheck to paycheck, their struggles are life-altering, causing anxiety, relocations, and uncertainty. They’re constantly beaten down by public officials who sell them out at every turn. It is a downward spiral from which many never recover.
Through my research on abuse at nonprofit hospitals who aggressively pursue the poor, un and under-insured for hospital bills (puffed up by as much as 1,000 percent) while doling out million dollar compensation packages – including bonuses, first-class travel, and housing – to paper-pushing executives at the top, I co-founded Medicare for All–NJ, a coalition of advocates fighting for a sane, economical, truly universal health care system – Expanded and Improved Medicare for All – which would end the inequity at nonprofit hospitals by putting them on a global budget (a proven practice which worked for half a century at Johns Hopkins Medical School and Charity Hospital serving everyone who needed medical care at no cost irrespective of race, gender, age, or economic status).
As I examine the financial ledgers of these powerful nonprofit and government entities, I see firsthand – and illuminate – the lies they offer to citizens, laid bare in the numbers.
Case in point: What is happening in my County.
Within the last 6 months, Monmouth County Freeholders have embarked on a contrived campaign to convince residents we must dump two of our publicly-owned nursing homes (privatize) – Geraldine L. Thompson and John L. Montgomery – by insisting they are costing the taxpayers millions of dollars each year, including a loss for the year projected to be $6.6 million. The widely-read paper, The Asbury Park Press, which covers two counties, is seemingly complacent in this propaganda.
Four open public records requests, I filed immediately upon reading their plan, requesting the financial documents supporting these large losses were either denied (as not specific enough even though I requested the document which I was told to ask for by one of the county freeholders) or simply ignored. From the beginning, the County refused to provide any detail, any evidence whatsoever that these two nursing homes are costing the taxpayers’ money despite headlines which screamed:
“County Mulls Sale of Nursing Facilities” 8/22/13 Asbury Park Press, front page;
“Our View: Time to unload nursing homes” 8/26/13 Asbury Park Press;
“Monmouth County must sell its nursing homes” Op-ed 8/29/13 Asbury Park Press
The argument as put forth in those three articles is this: The two, county-run facilities “lost a combined $5.8 million in the first six months of this year [2013], continuing a six-year pattern of deficits, according to figures provided by county officials.”
Additionally, the County is concerned with how the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) will affect reimbursement for Medicaid beds (80 to 85 percent of patients at county-run facilities are Medicaid patients): “John Donnadio, executive director of the New Jersey Association of Counties, said county-run nursing homes have historically cared for the most vulnerable of populations who may not be able to afford private nursing homes. But homes are struggling to stay afloat because of cuts in Medicaid payments.”
Investigating this last allegation, I found NJ actually increased Medicaid nursing home reimbursement by $30 million. According to Legal Notice from the NJ Division of Aging Service, for the current fiscal period 7/1/13 thru 6/30/14: “The amounts appropriated for Payments for Medical Assistance Recipients – not be less than the per diem rate last received by that facility for Fiscal Year [thru 6/30] 2013.”
After the County’s denial to my OPRA requests last fall, I secured the support of community organizations in a letter sent to the County Freeholders demanding a response to my OPRA requests.
The County finally released the 2-page financial document which showed each nursing home was losing about $3 million per year. The numbers were so seemingly “hand-picked”, I was forced to dig deeper into the sludge of misdirection.
Before I could complete my investigation, more OpEds appeared, this time in local, community papers advocating for the sale of the homes to private investors:
“County healthcare facilities must be privatized”, The Link News 4/10/14
“Curley [Monmouth County Freeholder]: County health care facilities must be privatized”, The Atlanticville 4/10/14
The Link editors supported the sale of these facilities reasoning it would “put the County on a more stable financial footing” which is a laughable assertion considering the County’s most recent audited financial statement showed a $122 million total surplus (revenue over expenses) – or twenty-three percent of the $523 million budget. The County has had so much extra money coming in annually ($55 million excess in 2013 alone – page 21 “Surplus – Current Fund Year 2013, Annual Financial Statement dated 1/26/14”), it is instituting a flat tax rate for the upcoming fiscal year!
Additionally, these two editorials complain that Medicaid funding is “dwindling….with no end in sight”.
If this is the case, and given the fact a majority of nursing revenue is secured through Medicaid, why would any private operator want to own any nursing facility?
What magical wand will profit-first operators wave to put these nursing homes on the road to (alleged) financial recovery? Well, first, since most of the employees are union workers who have already given the County millions in concessions over the last few years (and whose average annual salary is $26,000), it is likely these health care providers will continue to be further beaten down.
Second, these publically-owned and operated facilities which care for our most vulnerable citizens, will likely be sold at fire sale prices (blaming the high cost of operation) similar to what has been happening to nonprofit hospitals throughout New Jersey over the past few years: sold to Wall Street hedge fund investors only to be turned into high-ticketed (inadequate) health care providers.
The critical question to be asked is why these two facilities are (allegedly) losing money when other nonprofit nursing homes in NJ – offering comparable care – are not. What is it about these taxpayer-owned assets that makes the Freeholders so anxious to sell them, especially when the County is taking in “reserves” each year hand over fist?
Who will benefit most from the sale of these homes to the private profiteers?
The answer most certainly will not be the residents or the health care providers at the Monmouth County Geraldine L. Thompson or John L. Montgomery long-term care facilities.
Lynn M. Petrovich
Copyright 2014