Battle for health district funding not over yet

It has been eight weeks since Nevada’s highest court ruled that Clark County underfunded the Southern Nevada Health District in 2011.

The decision meant the cash-strapped county had to cough up about $18 million more for the public health agency – money county officials said would have to come from increased taxes or reduced services on such things as police and hospital care.

But the health district has yet to see the money, and the county has yet to give up the fight.

The county petitioned the Supreme Court for a rehearing, a move the health district sees as an exercise in futility.

“It’s a delay. But their chances are slim,” said Terry Coffing, an attorney for the health district.

The district sued the County Commission for underfunding its budget and failing to provide $15.9 million to replace its former headquarters on Shadow Lane.

That 50-year-old building closed in the spring after health officials deemed it structurally unsafe. The facility’s closure forced the agency to temporarily cut back some services and scatter others across the valley. Health officials scrambled to get information to clients about when and where they could get services.

The district since has moved into a roomier leased building near the Meadows mall. The facility allows more administrative functions to be housed under one roof, improving communication and efficiency, staffers say.

But it’s not the permanent home they’ve long wanted and argued they deserve.

“Right now, a permanent solution to a permanent facility is the top priority for the agency,” said Jennifer Sizemore, a health district spokeswoman.

FINGER POINTING

Coffing said the health district did everything it could to avoid landing in court because of funding issues.

“It’s a fight the health district desperately sought to avoid,” he said. “They were not spoiling for a fight.”

A county spokesman declined to comment because the rehearing is before the court.

But Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani disagreed with Coffing.

The county would have preferred to “sit down and argue it out,” she said. “That really didn’t happen. There was more a sense of entitlement” from the health district.

In court, the health district argued that according to state statute, its share of property tax revenue should have amounted to about $22.5 million in 2011. Commissioners instead approved funding for $5.69 million.

“We sent them as much as we felt they needed,” Giunchigliani said. “We were all hurting at the time.”

The county has cut one in five positions and $230 million from its budget in the past four years.

A lower court judge ruled in the health district’s favor. So did the Supreme Court, in a 6-1 decision that also requires the commission to properly fund the health district’s current and future budgets. The difference amounts to
$18.2 million.

Justices ruled that a state law enacted in 2005 requires the County Commission to adopt the health district’s budget “without modification” if the amount requested “does not exceed” 3.5 cents per $100 of assessed value of the county’s property tax revenue.

The county argued that the law meant it could fund the health district as it saw fit, if it didn’t exceed the cap.

Noting that the law on allocated revenue to the health district was ambiguous, justices said that during legislative hearings the intent of the enabling bill was to provide a stable funding source.

They ruled that testimony before the Assembly Committee on Health and Human Services showed the Legislature wanted the health district to have a revenue stream “free from county interference.”

The county has asked for a rehearing based partly on the argument that the court looked only at legislative history in the state Assembly, not in the Senate. The county also argued that the health district improperly included capital items in its operating budget and “improperly collected millions of dollars.”

CAN’T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG?

Regardless of what the court decides, the county and health district are striking a more cordial tone. They say they’re working together to come to an agreement outside the courtroom.

Giunchigliani credited a leadership change at the health district for the shift. Dr. Lawrence Sands resigned as chief health officer in June, saying he wanted to consider new opportunities. Dr. John Middaugh, director of the district’s division of community health, was named interim chief health officer.

“We’re finally having a conversation,” Giunchigliani said. “Let’s set aside what’s happening in the courts and figure out a win-win for everybody.”

That win-win probably will involve a new building for the health district.

County officials first offered to build the agency a new headquarters last year in exchange for the district dropping lawsuits over funding and owning property. But some board members appeared dismissive of the idea and questioned the county’s motives in offering to make peace.

Giunchigliani said the building would have to be bonded through the county. That could come in place of money the county now owes the district.

“We don’t have $18 million in cash set aside,” Giunchigliani said.

Coffing stopped short of saying the two parties are negotiating a new building.

“Our first choice is to work something out,” he said. “There’s a definitive option we’ll put out there. It’s creative and I think the average person would embrace it as a good idea.”

He added that the health district “is not out to make enemies or bankrupt anybody. We want to work something out without further involvement of those nasty lawyers.”

Contact Lynnette Curtis at Lynnette.Curtis@yahoo.com.