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Illinois Issues
VOL. 1, NO. 5/MAY 1975
ILLINOIS ISSUES is published by Sangamon State University. The publisher/editor serves as a faculty member of the university. He is selected by a board whose members are appointed by the presidents of Sangamon State University and the University of Illinois. In addition to subscription income the magazine is supported by a grant from the Ford Foundation, support from the University of Illinois and Sangamon State University, and donations. The contents of the magazine do not necessarily reflect the views of either university, the Ford Foundation or other donors.

Publisher/editor: William L. Day

Assistant editors: Caroline Gherardini,J. M. (Mike) Lennon

Contributing staff: Gary Adkins, ConradP. Rutkowski

Business manager: William J. Geekie

Marketing consultant: J. B. Spalding

Secretary: Louise Herndon

The Board
Samuel K. Gove, University of Illinois, Urbana, Chairman William W. Alien, Illinois Agricultural Association, Bloomington Richard H. Carver. Mayor, Peoria Robert C. Gibson, Illinois State Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations. Chicago Philip Kendall, Sangamon State University, Springfield Mrs. Randall Nelson, Carbondale Odas Nicholson. Lawyer, Chicago .lames D. Nowlan. Knox College, Gaiesburg James T. Otis. Lawyer, Chicago Theodore Peterson, University of Illinois, Urbana Honorable Samuel H. Shapiro, Lawyer, Kankakee Chris Vlahoplus, Sangamon State University, Springfield James M. Wall. The Christian Century. Chicago Samuel W. Witwer. Lawyer, Chicago William L. Day, ex officio member

ILLINOIS ISSUES is published monthly (12 times per year).
Editorial and business offices: 226 Capital Campus. Sangamon State University, Springfield, Illinois 62708. Telephone: (217) 786-6536.
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© 1975 by ILLINOIS ISSUES. 226 CC. Sangamon State, Springfield. Illinois 62708.
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Letters from Readers
Hospital building costs
EDITOR: McConnell (February 1975) implies that hospital building control is not the answer to rising health care costs. I do not think that anyone believes that hospital building control is a panacea for rising costs. There are numerous factors responsible for these rising costs. Although it is difficult to pinpoint many such factors in order to establish quantitative causal relationships, clearly hospital building is among the causes. Thus, hospital building control, as one element of the containment of rising costs, has been sought after by health planners.

Additionally, the goals of health planners are not limited to reducing the rising costs of health care. Another concern is that of providing geographically distributed health care. This may be accomplished in part by discouraging expansion of facilities in overserviced areas and stimulating development and expansion of facilities in poorly serviced areas. Thus, the new authority of CHPA to regulate hospital building (P.A. 78-1156) is also indirectly a means of arriving at even distribution of health care.
Samuel F. Hohmann Springfield, Illinois

We thought McConnell fairly presented both sides of the controversial issue of controlling hospital construction. As for providing geographically distributed health care, she slated, "In effect, the CHPA Board has the responsibility of getting or keeping health care facilities in the most desirable geographic and demographic locations" (p. 42).---Editors

EDITOR: The statement is made that the new law grants power to the State Board "to rule on permits for new health care facilities as well as determining whether existing facilities should remain open or not [emphasis by undersigned]." P.A. 78-1156, The Illinois Health Facilities Planning Act, requires that a permit [be] obtained prior to "construction or modification" of a health care facility. This does include, in addition to expansion of existing facilities, the establishment of a new facility and the discontinuation of a health care facility. However,

nothing in the law allows the State Board to determine whether existing facilities (or any particular departments or services, therein) should remain open or not. Even when hospitals or departments within hospitals are operating at such low occupancies as to make it questionable that they can continue to operate efficiently and well, the State Board can take no action to close them. So far as I know, none of the 24 state laws, having the same purpose as the Illinois law, contain such authority. However, the matter is being discussed and considered in many quarters throughout the country. Someday this kind of "recertification" of the need for the facility or service may become a part of these laws.
George A. Lindsley, M.P.H.
Executive Secretary Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board

Scrapbook
Board of Elections staffing
HIRING POLICIES of the new State Board of Elections came under scrutiny in a two-part special report by Susan Sachs in the Springfield State Journal-Register (2/27 and 2/28/75).

Sachs said the board "is staffed almost, from top to bottom by people sponsored by legislative party leaders." The board is appointed by the governor from nominees submitted by the four leaders. (For more on the legislative history of the board, see "The' General Assembly and the 1970 Constitution," by Ann Lousin, p. 131.) The board has 82 regular employees, Sachs said in addition, attorneys and others are hired for special duty during elections.

The newspaper followed the story with an editorial (3/2/75) urging the board to set up a merit system for hiring and promoting employees (it is exempt from the Personnel Code) and also to designate an executive director to reduce the dominance of the chairman of the bipartisan four-member board.

130 /Illinois Issues/May 1975