The D.C. Council will vote Tuesday whether to take up to $6 million from tobacco and insurance taxes to subsidize Southeast’s troubled United Medical Center, which Councilman David Catania says is losing nearly a half-million dollars every month.
Formerly known as Greater Southeast Community Hospital, the facility has been plagued with serious financial difficulties in recent years, including two bankruptcies.
The hospital lost nearly $4.5 million last year alone, said Catania, who chairs the council’s health committee and proposed the bill. The losses, Catania said, stem from the fact that 90 percent of the hospital’s patients are either uninsured or covered by Medicaid and Medicare programs, which do not reimburse hospitals for the full cost of medical treatment.
The first $3 million of the aid money would be given to the hospital in a single installment to help cover unpaid bills. The additional funds would be allocated on a monthly basis, as reimbursement for the facility treating uninsured D.C. residents. Currently, United Medical Center spends around $1 million a month to treat patients without insurance.
The city pumped nearly $80 million into the hospital in 2008, after it was bought by Specialty Hospitals of America LLC. Thirty-million dollars came from grants and $49 million from loans. At the time, the company reportedly owed the District $1 million in unpaid property taxes, and D.C. Chief Financial Officer Natwar Gandhi warned the council that Specialty was “not in strong financial condition.”
Catania, a vehement supporter of United Medical Center, defended Specialty and maintained that the hospital was moving in the right direction.
“Has it turned out exactly as we hoped? No. But are we on the right track? Yes,” he said during a legislative meeting on Monday. “This is a work in progress, but it is a worthy work.”
