Challenges to Tax Exempt Status

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Why Community Benefit Is Important
900 am session
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The Mission Imperative

• Our Identity
• Our Tradition
• Our Commitment

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Our Tradition

• Our organizations were established not for
  economic opportunity but to address the need for
  health services in our communities. Our
  facilities were born out of community need, a
  tradition that continues today.
• Sr. Carol Keehan, DC
• President and CEO
• Catholic Health Association

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Our Tradition

• Mother Joseph, born in Montreal, led a group of
  five missionaries to the Pacific Northwest. She
  was responsible for the completion of 11
  hospitals, 7 academies, 5 Indian schools and 2
  orphanages. As architect and artist, she
  designed and supervised their construction as
  well as fund raising.

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Some Guiding Principles

• Catholic social teaching tells us that
• Health care is a basic human good essential to
  human flourishing
• Without good health, persons abilities to
  thrive may be diminished and they may suffer
  spiritual, temporal, and material decline
• Their ability to pursue meaningful relationships
  becomes diminished
• Human dignity and life itself may be lost

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Human Dignity

• Most fully expressed and recognized within the
  context of community
• Humans are social beings
• Relating to others develops the gifts God has
  bestowed upon us

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Call to Serve the Poor and Vulnerable

• Jesus reached out to the poor, sick, and
  vulnerable
• Biblical mandate to care for the poor
• Must be expressed in concrete action within
  Catholic health care
• Prompts direct care of the poor and advocacy on
  behalf of the needy

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Call to Serve the Poor and Vulnerable

• Catholic health care is called to provide
  service to and advocacy for those people whose
  social condition puts them at the margins of
  society and makes them particularly vulnerable to
  discrimination.
• From Ethical and Religious Directives, 3

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The Common Good

• All persons share a
• Common God
• A common human relationship that calls us to be
  our brothers keeper

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The Common Good

• Stands in direct opposition to the individualism
  of the dominant American culture
• Calls us to interdependence between personal
  betterment and the improvement of society
  (Gaudium et Spes)

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Why?

• Not just to preserve tax-exempt status
• Not because of external challenges
• Because it is the right thing to do
• It arises from our Catholic identity
• It ensures that we act in accordance with what we
  proclaim

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Why?

• It takes seriously the Catholic belief that human
  dignity is best expressed within the context of
  community
• It involves the local community
• It empowers the local community
• It involves a broad representation from the
  health care community

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Community Benefit

• Commitment to the common good of all
• Urges Catholic health care to press beyond
  charity care to
• Advocate for the poor and vulnerable
• Provide preventive care for those who are well
• Seek out those in need
• We believe that
• Everyone must be given an equal opportunity to
  thrive and participate in the life of the
  community, and all of us are responsible for
  affording that opportunity to others
• Community Benefit is
• Viable expression of the churchs recognition
  that we are sisters and brothers called upon to
  support and sustain one another throughout lifes
  journey

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The Accountability Imperative

• The law Community Benefit Standard
• Congressional interest
• We need to be accountable

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Community Benefit Standard

• 501 (c)(3)
• Revenue Ruling 69-545
• Organized and operated for charitable
• purposes
• Governed by a community board
• Open medical staff
• Emergency room open to all
• Surplus to additional services or facilities

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Congressional and Other Interests

• House of Representatives
• Ways and Means Committee
• Senate Finance Committee
• IRS

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Efforts Toward Standardization

• 1980s The Catholic Health Association (CHA)
  developed the Social Accountability Budget
• 1990s CHA and VHA Inc. partnered with Lyon
  Software on Community Benefit Inventory for
  Social Accountability (CBISA) software
• 2004 CHA, VHA, and Lyon Software published
  Community Benefit Reporting Guidelines and
  Standard
• Definitions for the Community Benefit Inventory
  for Social Accountability
• 2006 CHA partnered with other organizations
  to reach consensus on accounting principles
  published A Guide for Planning and Reporting
  Community Benefit

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A Guide for Planning and Reporting Community
Benefit June 2006
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Advice from the Field
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Notes
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Tools
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Categories

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Website
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Resources Available

• The Catholic Health Association
  www.chausa.org/communitybenefit
• Association for Community Health
  Improvement http//www.communityhlth.org/communit
  yhlth/resources/communitybenefit.html
• Lyon Software - www.lyonsoftware.com