Teachers Union Supports Ravenstahl Tax Battle against UPMC from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"""UPMC must clearly make a choice: to live up to its tax-exempt status and meet the criteria that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has put forth, or to pay its share on taxes that would be enough to eliminate the deficits of both the Pittsburgh Public Schools and the Port Authority.""

Pittsburgh Starts Legal Battle with UPMC over Nonprofit Status from WESA 
"The Pennsylvania Supreme Court developed a nonprofit test as a result of the case Hospital Utilization Project v. Commonwealth. An organization must act within the following five "HUP" test parameters in order to be considered a purely public charity: ... Ravenstahl said UPMC fails three out of five. He added UPMC's city property and payroll taxes would amount to approximately $20 million."

UPMC, Pittsburgh Stake Positions for Court Fight on Nonprofit Status from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Starting in January, staff at a longtime Pittsburgh law firm, Strassburger Mckenna Gutnick & Gefsky, researched whether UPMC met the "HUP test," a five-point test that the state Supreme Court reemphasized in a landmark ruling last year. The conclusion, firm President E.J. Strassburger wrote in a 13-page letter to city solicitor Daniel D. Regan on March 5: "As we have discussed, waging a legal battle against a behemoth like UPMC will be neither quick nor easy. However, we believe that both challenges are well-justified, because ... UPMC appears to fail the constitutional test for qualifying" as an institution of purely public charity."

Pittsburgh Lawsuit Challenges UPMC's Tax Status from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl likened it to "the David versus the Goliath." The David, in this case, is the cash-strapped City of Pittsburgh, whose coffers are feeling the strain of burgeoning pension obligations and rising health care costs -- the plight of many municipalities across the state. The Goliath that Pittsburgh faces is UPMC, a $10 billion medical enterprise defined by superlatives -- largest health care provider in the region, biggest property owner in Allegheny County."
Here are the legal justifications for the lawsuit.

NEWS CONFERENCE!!

Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl is Expected to Challenge the Tax-exempt Status of Health Care Giant UPMC at a News Conference on Wednesday from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
"Officials in Ravenstahl's administration declined to discuss details, but spokeswoman Marissa Doyle said an announcement is set for 11:30 a.m."

Mayor Luke Ravenstahl

PERSPECTIVE!!

Health Care to Stay Crucial to Pittsburgh Economy from the Pittsburgh Business Times
"Medicine will continue to drive the western Pennsylvania economy, despite intense pressure to curb health care spending, PNC Economist Mekael Teshome said Friday. Pittsburgh’s population has been increasing, albeit slowly, and the city will continue to be a hub for sophisticated medical care, attracting patients from outside the region, Teshome said. Studies have shown that Pittsburgh’s health care utilization rates are higher than other areas with comparable demographics, which Medicare is trying to curb through innovative pilot programs and cost-cutting. In addition, hospitals and other health care providers are facing cuts in Medicare reimbursement."

Mekael Teshome

Health Care, Manufacturing Jobs Rise as U.S. Unemployment Falls from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"The national unemployment rate ticked down slightly in February by one-tenth of a percentage point from 7.8 percent to 7.7 percent as the country added 236,000 new jobs."

TECHNOLOGY!!

UPMC Brings Telemedicine to Rural County Hospitals from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

"magine living in a rural county but getting the expertise of doctors at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh without having to travel to the city. A webcam and Internet connection that debuts on Monday will allow that to happen for parents who take their children to one of five hospitals, courtesy of UPMC and the University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences. The Outreach program, short for Optimizing Utilization and Rural Emergency Access for Children, brings telemedicine to UPMC Northwest Hospital in Venango County, UPMC Horizon Hospital in Mercer County, Washington Hospital, Armstrong County Memorial Hospital and DuBois Regional Medical Center in Clearfield County."

EDITORIAL!!

Want Choice? from the Editorial Board of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 
"The fight is over whether people and businesses will be able to keep choice on medical care and health insurance, or be doomed to a high-priced UPMC monopoly that eventually controls both. It's just that simple."

Single Moms Can Find Little Relief from Chronic Stress from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Stress is to single motherhood what mud is to rain and dirty dishes are to cooking, with more severe consequences. It's an expected but unwelcome consequence that must be cleaned up before it gets messy. Unfortunately, like a NASCAR driver, the single mother faces stress at every turn.

UPMC Settles Dozens of Unfair Labor Practices Complaints Filed by SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"In a news release, SEIU said the Pittsburgh health system will be required to rescind its policies regarding preventing employees from talking about the union-organizing effort as long as it is not done in patient care areas. UPMC managers and supervisors also will undergo training about complying with labor laws."

Pa. Lawmaker Wants to Spend Impact Fee Money on Fracking Health Study from State Impact Pennsylvania
"Suburban Philadelphia Republican State Sen. Stewart Greenleaf is working on a bill that would allocate $2 million from the state’s impact fee fund to study the public health impacts of Marcellus Shale drilling."

PERSPECTIVE!!

No Help Wanted: In Filing to Labor Board, UPMC Claims it Has No Employees (Charlie Deitch) from the Pittsburgh City Paper
"They're proud to say it's their people who make them who they are — right up until it's time to treat those people fairly ... Remember the UPMC advertisements that used to claim the health-care giant was "not a business" but "a collection of people, and surprises and ideas you weren't expecting"? Apparently, it's not even that much. In a Jan. 3 filing to the National Labor Relations Board, the nonprofit health-care giant — routinely identified as the region's largest employer — claims it actually has no employees at all. "

Under the Radar: Fracking Wastewater Radioactive from the Beaver Times 
"Moyer said he began transporting brine, the wastewater from gas wells that have been hydraulically fractured, for a small hauling company in August 2011. He trucked brine from wells to treatment plants and back to wells, and sometimes cleaned out the storage tanks used to hold wastewater on drilling sites. By November 2011, the 49-year-old trucker was too ill to work."

Livestock Falling Ill in Fracking Regions, Raising Concerns About Food (Elizabeth Royte) from Public Source
"In the midst of the domestic energy boom, livestock on farms near oil-and-gas drilling operations nationwide have been quietly falling sick and dying. While scientists have yet to isolate cause and effect, many suspect chemicals used in drilling and hydrofracking (or “fracking”) operations are poisoning animals through the air, water, or soil." http://publicsource.org/investigations/livestock-falling-ill-fracking-regions-raising-concerns-about-food

Protesters Call on UPMC to Pay its ‘Fair Share’ from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
"More than 100 community members and activists called on UPMC to adopt a “new code of conduct” during a protest Thursday morning in front of the City-County Building, Downtown. Chanting slogans for UPMC to “pay your fair share,” they said the health-care giant should contribute more money to the city …"

Children‘s Hospital of Pittsburgh can Proceed with its Plan to Build a Four-story Pediatric Center in South Fayette from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
"On Wednesday night, the five members of the Board of Commissioners unanimously approved the hospital‘s site plan for its proposed $20.5 million center."

UPMC Teams with CMU for Big Data Training from the Pittsburgh Business Times
"This month a handful of University of Pittsburgh Medical Center employees are headed back to school as part of the healthcare organization’s big investment in its data analytics and data warehousing. The move is part of a $100 million project UPMC announced last fall and includes partnerships with companies such as IBM and Oracle. It also includes working with Carnegie Mellon University..."

RADIO PROGRAM!!

Advances in Medicine and Robotics from WESA's program, Essential Pittsburgh
"We’ll learn about a new development in robotics with the potential to offer autonomy to quadriplegics and more!"

EDITORIAL!!

Care Comes First: Health Systems Shouldn't Let Patients be Dumped from the editorial board of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"UPMC and Highmark should not let their business war allow patients to fall through the cracks when doctors change affiliation."