Nonprofit alters abortion plans for Arkansas

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Planned Parenthood says it has stopped providing medication-induced abortions at its facility in northwest Arkansas while it seeks a new location, leaving the state for now with two abortion providers.

Planned Parenthood Great Plains Chief Executive Officer Brandon Hill said in a court filing over the weekend that the organization stopped providing abortions at its health center in Fayetteville while it looks for a new site.

The drop in Arkansas’ available providers comes as neighboring Missouri faces the prospect of becoming the first state without a functioning abortion clinic since 1974, the year after the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision.

Planned Parenthood doesn’t offer surgical abortions at the Fayetteville clinic or its Little Rock facility but an unaffiliated clinic, Little Rock Family Planning Services, does.

Hill said Planned Parenthood is not renewing its lease in Fayetteville, because of “increasing problems with our landlord” over issues such as managing the presence of protesters near the clinic.

Hill said in the court filing that Planned Parenthood has contacted dozens of landlords, management companies and property owners but has been unable to find a lease that is move-in ready or would only require minor modifications, in part because some landlords are unwilling to rent to the group in light of ongoing, high-profile disputes over abortion.

The providers are challenging three new abortion restrictions set to take effect July 24. The restrictions include one that attorneys say would likely force the closure of Little Rock Family Planning, the state’s only surgical abortion provider.