"From the St. Louis Post Dispatch"

Industry donated $1 million in Illinois election
By CAROLYN TUFT Post-Dispatch
12/22/2002 12:00 AM

Nursing homes gave more than $1 million to political candidates in Illinois for their latest campaigns - a 60 percent jump in contributions since the last campaign cycle.

Gov.-elect Rod Blagojevich, a Democrat, got $211,250, including $100,000 from a single trade group that lobbies legislators on behalf of more than 200 nursing homes in Illinois, according to the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform.

The Chicago group is a bipartisan center for research and advocacy. It studied all the money that flowed into political campaigns for candidates in Illinois this year.

Violet King, who founded the watchdog group Nursing Home Monitors in Godfrey, says the nursing home industry is "trying to buy off" politicians.

"What makes me angry is that these lobby groups are getting money from nursing homes that should be going toward the care of the nursing home residents," King said. "This money is coming straight out of the nursing home residents' mouths and out of funds that are supposed to be used for their care."

An executive for one of the trade groups insists the nursing home industry made the contributions because it hoped to make nursing home funding a campaign issue.

"I think we did make the issue front and center," said Terrence Sullivan, director of the Illinois Council on Long Term Care.

Nationally, Missouri and Illinois candidates appear to receive far more money from the nursing home industry than candidates in other states. For example, in state elections in 2000, candidates in Illinois got $596,991, while their counterparts in Missouri took in $510,412, according to the National Institute on Money in State Politics.

To put those numbers in perspective, consider that candidates in California received $82,000 during the same period, and those in Texas got $28,450, according to the institute, which is a nonpartisan, nonprofit research group.

Missouri and many other states have limits on the size of campaign contributions. Illinois has no limits. The Campaign for Political Reform group also found that in the most recent election cycle, Illinois politicians, from the governor to state legislators, got:

$1,026,644 from nursing homes and their trade groups that lobby politicians.

$265,225 from the Illinois Council on Long Term Care, a group that represents more than 220 Illinois nursing homes and 26,000 of their workers.

$147,000 from the Illinois Health Care Association, a trade group that represents more than 450 nursing homes and rehabilitation centers across the state.

William Kempiners, the health care association's executive director, already has strong ties to state lawmakers. He is a former state representative who left office and headed the Illinois Department of Public Health before going to the association. The state's health department regulates nursing homes through inspections and investigations into abuse and neglect.

King said that with so much money flowing campaigns, she thinks there's "no hope for nursing home reform until we have campaign finance reform."

"When the nursing home industry gives $1 million in contributions, it means they have an open-door policy with the legislators," King said. "The nursing home industry and not the resident has the politician's ear. It's really horrible."

David Morrison, coordinator for the political reform group, said in the most recent election cycle, the nursing homes felt they needed help from a cash-strapped state. And they felt that to get their politicians' attention, they should go through their wallets, he said.

"It's not that they are civic-minded," Morrison said. "They are looking out for their own interests and they do that through money."

Sullivan, the trade group representative, said that central to the issue for nursing home operators in Illinois is the 5.9 percent cut in state funding last year that meant a $110 million loss. The cut meant that the nursing homes now operate with 5,500 fewer caregivers.

While the state ranks in the top 10 wealthiest in the nation, it ranks near the bottom - 49th - in the amount of money the state spends on nursing homes, he said.

"And that's an abomination," Sullivan said.