Continued funding for Valleywise Health leading

A Maricopa County ballot measure calling for continued funding of the Valleywise Health system was leading, according to updated election results released Wednesday night.

The Phoenix-based public safety-net health organization was formerly known as the Maricopa Integrated Health System.

Proposition 449, if passed, would continue to provide 12% of the Valleywise annual budget for the next 20 years via special secondary county property taxes.

“We knew that there was a lot of support and it was polling well. But I learned long ago, you don’t count any chickens before they are hatched,” Valleywise Health President and CEO Steve Purves said Thursday.

Purves said he’s grateful for the support shown by Maricopa County voters.

“We’re very fortunate that among the general public, the right supports us and the left supports us. It’s non-partisan,” he said.

Property owners in the county have been providing the funding via a special tax levy since 2004 and currently provides about $80 million per year to Valleywise.

The levy originally passed in 2003, when the “yes” answers collected 58.4% of the vote. Although it technically wasn’t supposed to expire until August 2025, it was placed on the 2020 ballot for planning purposes.

The “yes” vote means

secondary

property taxes, via a special tax district, will continue to fund Valleywise. The special tax district is overseen by a district governing board of five elected officials who serve four-year terms.

Having a public health system is key to a vibrant community with a good quality of life for everyone, regardless of their economic status, Purves said.

Without revenue from the special tax district, Valleywise would not be able to have the robust resident program that it operates now because it’s so expensive to train doctors, he said.

If Proposition 449 does not pass, the health system would have to look at eliminating some services, which is “not a prospect that’s good for the community,” he said.

“We really don’t generate internal sources of capital with our payer mix. We operate out of the generosity of the public,” he said.

What is Valleywise Health?

Phoenix-based Valleywise Health includes, among other services, a public teaching hospital that contains both a

Level 1 (highest level) trauma center and Arizona’s only nationally verified burn center.

The system operates the 325-bed Valleywise Health Medical Center in central Phoenix that includes the Arizona Burn Center, and the 168-bed Valleywise Behavioral Health Center — Maryvale, which is an inpatient psychiatric facility and also has an emergency room open to all patients, not just those needing behavioral health care.

In total, Valleywise has nearly 400 inpatient psychiatric beds at three Maricopa County sites.

Valleywise, which also operates family medical clinics throughout the Phoenix area, serves a disproportionately high number of low-income and uninsured people and includes family care clinics and behavioral health services, including inpatient psychiatric beds, across the county.

Sixty percent of the system’s patients are enrolled in the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System, which is Arizona’s Medicaid program for low-income people.

Valleywise Health Medical Center has been treating patients throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. The 85008 zip code where the hospital is located has been one of the hardest-hit areas in the state for COVID-19 infections, data from the Arizona Department of Health Services shows.

How much is the secondary property tax?

This year, the secondary property tax that funds Valleywise amounts to an estimated $36.86 per year for residential property owners of a home assessed at $200,000, or 0.18 cents per $100 of assessed value. The average owner-occupied home in Maricopa County has an assessed value of $211,500.

Since 2006, the amount of the secondary property tax levy has ranged from 0.08 cents to 0.19 cents per $100 of assessed value and the total amount collected has gone from $40 million to this year’s amount of $80.4 million.

Arizona statute specifies that the levy can’t exceed $40 million adjusted annually from the first year the tax was levied, based on a percentage equal to the rate of change in the levy limit between the current year and the prior year for the county in which the district is located.

For commercial property owners in Maricopa County, the estimated annual cost of the levy is $414.69 per year for a property assessed at $1.25 million. The average assessed commercial property value in Maricopa County is $1.22 mil

lion.

Who is supporting Proposition 449?

Among public supporters of Proposition 449 were U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz.; Maricopa County Sheriff Paul Penzone; Arizona Nurses Association Executive Director Robin Schaeffer; Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego; Mesa Mayor John Giles; Arizona Medical Association Chief Executive Officer Libby McDannell; Ann-Marie Alameddin, Arizona Hospital and Healthcare Association president and chief executive officer; and Steve Zabliski, executive director for St. Vincent de Paul in Phoenix.

There was no known organized opposition to Proposition 449.

Voters may recall a question related to Valleywise, then called the Maricopa Integrated Health System, on the 2014 ballot.

In 2014, voters authorized a $935 million bond to replace the 50-year-old Valleywise Health Medical Center and fund other upgrades over the next four years. That bond authorization was separate from the Proposition 449 tax levy.