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Business Journals
2 days ago
- General
- Business Journals
"Inspiring leaders of tomorrow — St. Luke, the first Catholic IB School in the Pacific NW."
St. Luke School — Inspiring Leaders of Tomorrow The First Catholic International Baccalaureate (IB) School for Primary and Middle Years in the Pacific Northwest. Since 1957, St. Luke School has been a cornerstone of academic excellence and community engagement in the north King/south Snohomish region. Initially staffed by three Edmond Dominican Sisters and one lay teacher, our first classes welcomed 125 students in grades one through five. Over the decades, we've grown and evolved—today serving over 260 families and 450 students in Preschool through eighth grade. Our reputation as one of the marquee Catholic schools in the area is built on a steadfast commitment to academic rigor, values-based education, and continuous innovation. Facilities and instructional programs are continually enhanced, and students enjoy a variety of extracurricular opportunities that enrich the learning experience. A Regional First in Catholic IB Education: In February 2021, St. Luke School became the first Catholic school in the Pacific Northwest authorized to offer both the International Baccalaureate (IB) Primary Years Programme (PYP) and Middle Years Programme (MYP). This distinction places St. Luke in an elite category of schools worldwide, blending the depth and discipline of Catholic education with the globally recognized inquiry-driven IB framework. The PYP serves students from Preschool through grade five, fostering curiosity, critical thinking, and the ability to make connections across disciplines. Students explore transdisciplinary themes such as Who We Are and How We Express Ourselves, building essential skills for lifelong learning. The MYP, designed for grades six through eight, challenges students through a broad curriculum that includes language acquisition, sciences, mathematics, arts, and design, while encouraging independent thinking, collaboration, and service. The program culminates in an 8th Grade Community Project, a meaningful capstone that demonstrates each student's ability to apply their learning to real-world challenges. Educating the Whole Child: Our mission—Inquiring minds, hearts for Jesus, and hands for service—guides every aspect of the St. Luke experience. We aim to educate the whole child: intellectually, spiritually, emotionally, and socially. Through a combination of academic excellence, faith formation, and community involvement, we prepare students to lead lives of purpose, compassion, and integrity. A Strong, Supportive Community: St. Luke is more than a school—it's a network of connection and support. Our close-knit community includes dedicated faculty and staff who know students by name, active parent organizations that support and enrich school life, and a parish that is deeply invested in the well-being of every family. These relationships help foster an environment where students feel valued, engaged, and inspired to reach their potential. Why St. Luke Stands Out: Proven Excellence — Over 68 years of continuous growth and achievement. Innovative Approach — First Catholic IB Primary and Middle Years School in the Pacific Northwest. Mission Alignment — Grounded in Catholic faith and the IB's global perspective. Community Focus — Strong partnerships among families, faculty, and parish. Holistic Development — Academic rigor combined with character formation and service. Join Us: We invite families and community members to learn more about what makes St. Luke School exceptional. Whether you are seeking a high-caliber education for your child, an engaged and values-driven community, or a school that blends tradition with innovation, St. Luke offers an unparalleled experience. Where leaders of tomorrow begin today — discover St. Luke School, the first Catholic IB School for Primary and Middle Years in the Pacific Northwest. Visit to explore our programs, schedule a tour, and see firsthand how St. Luke inspires students to think deeply, act justly, and lead with heart.
Yahoo
12-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
A health system is fighting Idaho's abortion ban. It's not its first controversial stance.
St. Luke's Medical Center in downtown Boise is the flagship hospital of the St. Luke's Health System. (Photo by Otto Kitsinger for Idaho Capital Sun) This article was produced in partnership with ProPublica. With a steady but urgent cadence, Dr. Jim Souza told reporters what would become one of the most cited talking points in a protracted legal fight over Idaho's abortion ban: Without a court order protecting emergency room doctors from prosecution, his hospital system was sending patients to nearby states when certain pregnancy complications meant termination might be necessary. It was April 2024. Souza said Boise-based St. Luke's Health System had airlifted six pregnant patients in a span of four months to states where abortion was a legal treatment option in health emergencies. That happened once in all of 2023, a time when a court order kept Idaho from enforcing the ban in those cases. Souza, the hospital system's chief physician executive, said Idaho's law was a looming threat to hospital workers and quality health care. St. Luke's delivered about 41% of Idaho babies last year. 'Fear is the problem. Fear of prosecution,' Souza said at the time. 'And even if it doesn't occur, it doesn't fix the jeopardy that is actively eroding our system of care.' Less than a year later, St. Luke's is the one major institution — other than advocacy groups — standing in the way of restrictions on emergency abortion care in Idaho, a state with one of the most absolute abortion bans in the country. The Justice Department on March 5 dropped a lawsuit brought under President Joe Biden that claimed Idaho's ban, which does not allow abortions to protect a patient's health, violated a federal law mandating access to emergency medical care. St. Luke's administrators, who made the same claim in their own lawsuit in January, vowed to press on. A temporary court order in the St. Luke's case will allow emergency abortions to take place for now. The abortion lawsuit is the latest controversial stance for a hospital system operating in a state whose political climate treats public institutions — hospitals, libraries, schools, health departments — not as the basic infrastructure of society but as ideological battlegrounds. St. Luke's defended its medical staff during the pandemic in 2020 and 2021, when residents objected to masks and vaccines. It took on Ammon Bundy, one of the state's flagbearers of far-right extremism, whose followers protested against hospital employees caught up in a child welfare case involving the grandchild of one of Bundy's friends. St. Luke's administrators declined to speak with States Newsroom and ProPublica for this story, citing the ongoing litigation. Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador, who is defending against the abortion challenge, has accused health care providers of deliberately misconstruing the ban's prohibitions. Labrador, whose career was built on being to the right of mainstream Republicans, also has said, without providing evidence, that the reason doctors are leaving Idaho is because they made 'the vast majority of their money on abortions, or they wanted to live in a place that allowed abortions.' The state lost 22% of its OB-GYN workforce and more than half the specialists who handle high-risk pregnancies in the 15 months after the Supreme Court abortion decision, according to a report from the Idaho Coalition for Safe Healthcare. Odette Bolano, the former CEO of Saint Alphonsus Health System, a St. Luke's competitor, said health care institutions have historically been reluctant to take on anything with political implications. They often stay neutral because they care for all patients regardless of politics. St. Luke's is here because we care about the pregnant patients in our community, and we want them to receive the emergency care that is available to anyone who presents to an emergency room. – Peg Dougherty, deputy general counsel for St. Luke's Health System, after a federal court hearing But Bolano, who led the Catholic-based system for six years, said everything seems to have taken on political undertones in recent years. She said health systems now have to take difficult positions when they feel something keeps them from delivering safe care. 'The price in reputation — regardless of whatever stance you take and steps you take to safeguard patients, visitors and the community at large — could be significant. It could land you in a very bad place,' she said, 'but values, integrity and ability to deliver on commitments have to take precedence.' In a small state like Idaho, where the population just crossed 2 million, St. Luke's is a behemoth. It has eight hospitals and ranks among the state's largest employers, with a workforce of 18,000 and more than $4 billion in revenue. It's also a nonprofit and unaffiliated with any national chain or any church, despite its name. During the COVID-19 pandemic, St. Luke's took in a crush of critically ill patients. Some had ignored public health advice and listened to people who said vaccines were harmful — including a local pathologist who promoted COVID-19 vaccine skepticism and ineffective treatments, then won appointment to a public health board alongside Labrador. Leading St. Luke's through the pandemic turmoil was Chris Roth. Roth joined the system in 2007. He led its Boise-area operations, worked as the system's chief operating officer, then became CEO when his longtime boss retired in February 2020. The next month, Idaho went into shelter-in-place mode with the rest of the world. Blaine County, anchored around the Sun Valley ski resort and a tiny St. Luke's hospital, became one of the nation's early COVID-19 hot spots. Roth and other St. Luke's leaders spoke out in support of public health measures while a small but loud contingent of Idahoans made a show of defying those measures: burning masks at the state Capitol, staging aggressive protests at the Boise region's health department and showing up at the homes of that agency's board members. Souza, who worked as a critical care doctor and pulmonologist in addition to his leadership role at St. Luke's, gave sobering warnings about the grave reality he saw in the hospital. In the lead-up to the 2020 holiday season, Souza went on a conservative talk radio show and urged listeners to heed public health advice. When health care organizations including St. Luke's announced they would require COVID-19 vaccines for employees, anti-vaccine groups set up protests outside hospitals and clinics belonging to St. Luke's and others. Roth described a sense of helplessness and anxiety in a 2021 interview with the Idaho Capital Sun: 'We're deeply concerned about our front-line caregivers, and they are just going through hell. Every day. And then they go out to the community, and it's business as usual — rodeos, fairs, football games, debates in the school boards.' He spoke of St. Luke's doctors who faced laughter from the audience at a school board meeting when they described the scene inside hospitals. 'It's like we're seeing the de-evolution of humanity, right in front of our eyes,' Roth said. As the nation was starting to emerge from the pandemic in 2022, another source of anxiety arose for St. Luke's and its hospital workers: Ammon Bundy. The flashpoint was the hospital's role in a child protection case involving the infant grandson of one of Bundy's friends. After police responded to a child welfare report by the baby's health care provider, the boy was taken to St. Luke's, where a doctor determined he was malnourished and in need of care, according to the subsequent lawsuit by St. Luke's and trial testimony. Bundy showed up at the hospital, demanding the baby be returned to his parents. (The baby was returned six days later. No one was charged with child abuse or neglect.) Bundy was arrested there and later pleaded guilty to trespassing. Bundy, a self-proclaimed defender against government tyranny, moved to Idaho from Arizona after prevailing against charges associated with the 2016 armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge office in eastern Oregon and a 2014 standoff over his father's unpermitted use of federal lands for cattle grazing in Nevada. During the pandemic, Bundy led a crowd that forced its way into the Idaho House of Representatives. He also founded the People's Rights Network, an organizing apparatus for people with populist, anti-government and survivalist goals. Bundy, his friend and their followers took to blogs and social media after the friend's grandson was taken to St. Luke's, and they coordinated protests outside the hospital, where they were joined by dozens of people, including far-right legislators. Those protests came to a head one day when Bundy posted a now-deleted video urging people to go to the hospital and begin 'making noise' because he believed the baby was about to be transferred to a foster placement and 'we need to go back there and get this straightened out. … This is an emergency.' Court records say the hospital went on lockdown and sent ambulances elsewhere for an hour as an angry, armed crowd gathered outside. Callers flooded the switchboard and sent profane and threatening emails to hospital staff and executives. Roth would later read one of the emails from a protester aloud in court. It included antisemitic and homophobic slurs and said Roth was 'getting strung up along with everyone else who is complacent in the medical tyranny.' The hospital system and some of its employees, including Roth, sued Bundy, his friend and their associated commercial operations in May 2022, alleging defamation. The lawsuit accused them of spinning lies that harmed St. Luke's and its employees — whose names, photos and personal information spread online via Bundy's allies and the People's Rights Network. Roth, in a court filing, said he worried that parents wouldn't bring in their children for care if they believed St. Luke's 'secretly vaccinates children and engages in child trafficking.' Citing armed protests against St. Luke's, Roth said it was important for the health system to stand up to bullying and intimidation. 'Inaction would signal that this type of behavior is acceptable in our community,' Roth wrote. 'It is not.' The baby's grandfather answered St. Luke's lawsuit by repeating, without evidence, his allegations against the health system. Bundy told States Newsroom and ProPublica in a recent interview he personally didn't make false allegations. He called someone else's claim that St. Luke's conspired to kidnap children 'so ridiculous.' But in a still-public Instagram post, made while the lawsuit was active, Bundy accused St. Luke's CEO of being 'an accessory to child abduction.' Bundy decided not to participate in the defamation case against him. For more than a year, he ignored the court proceedings and didn't show up to the trial to offer a defense. He thought the worst-case outcome would be a $50,000 default judgment, he told ProPublica. He was wrong. A jury rendered a $52 million judgment. Bundy and the People's Rights Network were responsible for about half. His co-defendant filed an appeal, and the appeal request is pending. Although Bundy did not appeal, his tangle with St. Luke's wasn't over. Bundy had a history of defying legal orders. After state officials barred him from the Capitol, police arrested Bundy multiple times for violating that order. After a court sentenced him to community service, Bundy tried to say campaign events during his failed bid for governor counted as service. St. Luke's was not going to let go of its courtroom win. When Bundy sold his property to a friend so that St. Luke's would have no claim to it, St. Luke's sued Bundy again — and it now owns the property. When he continued to defy court orders, St. Luke's sought contempt charges. While Bundy was being arraigned, the judge threatened him with arrest if, once again, he failed to show up for a trial. Bundy didn't show, and the judge issued a $250,000 misdemeanor warrant that remains active in Ada County. Bundy moved to Utah and, in July, filed for bankruptcy. Within days of the bankruptcy filing, St. Luke's was on Bundy's heels once more. The hospital system has since persuaded the bankruptcy court to order Bundy and his wife to show up and answer questions about their finances and assets. Bundy has called St. Luke's actions 'lawfare.' When asked for comment on his actions since the defamation suit was decided, Bundy said, among other things, 'Sounds like another hit piece.' The public positions St. Luke's took during COVID-19 and with Bundy were a precursor to its decision to take a stand on abortion as emergency treatment. 'St. Luke's is here because we care about the pregnant patients in our community, and we want them to receive the emergency care that is available to anyone who presents to an emergency room,' Peg Dougherty, deputy general counsel for St. Luke's Health System, said outside Boise's federal courthouse last week. Idaho's trigger abortion ban was ready to go two months after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade's protections of abortion rights in 2022. It criminalizes the termination of a pregnancy at any stage. Penalties include prison time, and the physician's medical license can be revoked. There are exceptions for documented rape and incest or to save a pregnant patient's life, but not to preserve the patient's health. Opponents say a health exception is essential in rare cases where emergency abortion is the best treatment option, such as when a patient's water breaks before the fetus is viable. That can quickly cause a deadly infection. In a brief to the Supreme Court describing one such case, an abortion rights group said the doctor, whom it did not name, decided it was necessary to wait until the patient's condition was life-threatening before feeling legally permitted to end the pregnancy. The group described the experience as 'traumatic for the patient and torture for the doctor.' The Biden Justice Department sued the state in 2022. The agency alleged Idaho's ban conflicts with a federal law, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, requiring any emergency room that accepts Medicare to offer stabilizing treatment to every patient who comes through the door. But Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador maintains there is no need for litigation because the matter is settled. 'The U.S. Supreme Court has already ruled that the Constitution does not contain a right to abortion and that laws protecting the sanctity of life are left up to the individual states. There is no conflict between the plain interpretation of Idaho's Defense of Life Act and EMTALA,' Labrador wrote in a statement to States Newsroom on Feb. 18. A series of shifting appeals and court orders in the case left emergency abortion care in Idaho legal, then illegal, then legal again since June. Anticipating that the Trump administration would drop the Biden-era challenge, St. Luke's sued in January, seeking a new order while the case proceeds. Senior U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill granted St. Luke's request for a temporary order on March 5, keeping emergency abortions legal while Winmill considers a longer-term injunction. Dr. Caitlin Gustafson, president of the Idaho Coalition for Safe Healthcare and a practicing family medicine obstetrician, said it is remarkable that St. Luke's is willing to use its power so that patients and doctors don't feel abandoned. 'The need for EMTALA isn't going away no matter what administration is there, and we're still stuck,' Gustafson said. She also suspects the lawsuit could be a bulwark against further attempts by politicians and interest groups to dictate the decisions of health care providers. Physicians and advocates in other states are watching. Dr. Christopher Ford, an emergency room physician in Wisconsin, has seen the effects of an abortion ban on emergency care, when abortion was effectively prohibited in Wisconsin for 15 months. 'We had patients presenting with partial surgical or medical abortions who were very apprehensive to seek care,' Ford said. 'We had very young patients from age 16, up to age 41 or 42, who were essentially septic and at incredible risk of mortality and morbidity.' He said it seems atypical for a hospital system to take on a lawsuit of this nature, and he is glad to see it. 'It's definitely a testimony to how important this is and how other hospitals should follow suit,' he said. 'Just reading it from the outside looking in, the hospitals are getting involved as a last-ditch effort as the only way to advocate for their patients sitting in front of them.' When health systems sue, it is typically over business matters. Individual doctors and patients are the usual plaintiffs in abortion cases, along with advocacy organizations like the Center for Reproductive Rights or Planned Parenthood. For those reasons, St. Luke's stands out. 'I think it's a testament to them meeting the moment,' said Melanie Folwell, executive director for Idahoans United for Women and Families, which is organizing an abortion rights ballot initiative for 2026. 'We are at an inflection point, and if they don't act, who will?' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
21-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Missouri hospital mergers come with one inevitable: Bigger executive paychecks
St. Luke's executives landed bigger bonuses and retirement windfalls in 2023 (Suzanne King/The Beacon). igger bonuses, higher executive salaries and a few eye-popping retirement payouts. That's how St. Luke's Health System closed the books on its final year as a nonprofit independent hospital chain, according to recent tax filings. The $2.5 billion hospital system, which merged with St. Louis-based nonprofit BJC Healthcare at the start of 2024, paid one-third more in bonuses and incentives to its top-earning employees in 2023 compared to the previous year. Combined total compensation for those employees, whose salaries are included in the hospital system's 990 tax filings, was up 27%. Not surprisingly, executives at the top of the organizational chart saw the biggest paydays. Dr. Melinda Estes, who retired as CEO when the merger was completed, had total compensation of $4.4 million, including a $2 million base salary, a $1.57 million bonus (46% bigger than the previous year's) and a $752,000 payout from a supplemental executive retirement plan (SERP). Chief Financial Officer Chuck V. Robb, who now is chief financial officer at BJC, pulled in total compensation of $7.8 million, thanks in large part to a $5.66 million retirement plan payout. (Robb had worked for St. Luke's for three decades.) Meanwhile, his 2023 bonus of $1.17 million, more than three times his 2022 bonus, was more than his $747,000 base salary. And Julie Quirin, who became St. Luke's president at the end of 2023 and is now president of BJC's western region, got total compensation of just under $1.9 million in 2023, including $960,000 base pay and a $521,000 bonus (24% more than the previous year). St. Luke's did not respond to requests for comment. While noteworthy, the health system's compensation packages are consistent with the broader nonprofit health care ecosystem. For decades, the trend has been to pay top hospital executives higher salaries as hospitals and health systems consolidate. In that context, executive salaries paid during St. Luke's last year as a standalone system are unsurprising. When compared with executives at other nonprofit systems, they aren't even exceptional. In 2021, nonprofit hospital systems Sentara Healthcare, CommonSpirit Health and Nuvance Health each paid their CEOs more than $30 million in total compensation, according to the Lown Institute, a nonpartisan health care think tank. Across the board, executive salaries at nonprofit hospitals are rising, surpassing what average hospital workers make caring for patients by ever-growing margins. In a study released last year, economists at Rice University found that CEO pay at independent hospitals and health systems jumped 30% between 2012 and 2019, from an average of around $996,000 in 2019 dollars to $1.3 million. Registered nurses, by contrast, had mean wage growth of 2.3% over the same period, from $75,652 in 2019 dollars to $77,460. Dr. Vikas Saini, Lown Institute president, said surging executive pay packages at nonprofit hospitals have been a long time coming. When Medicare was created in the 1960s, more people were insured, so hospitals gained a new source of revenue. Saini argued in an article published in Health Affairs that more revenue led to shifting attitudes in health care. Hospitals drifted from community-focused nonprofits toward behaving like big businesses. They added more corporate leaders to their boards, who made financial gains a newly important part of their mission. Merger between Kansas City and St. Louis hospital systems could mean bigger medical bills 'We pretend that hospitals are like other businesses,' he said. 'It's true, we don't want them losing money. We do want them to be solvent. But there's a difference between being solvent and serving the community and going all out like a business to maximize your revenue.' And along with the shift in attitudes about hospitals' missions came highly paid executives. Derek Jenkins, a health economist at Rice University, said he and his colleagues are studying whether the growing salaries are associated with better hospital quality. The answer is unclear. But another correlation is hard to dispute. 'It's definitely fair to say that higher profit (at the hospital) is associated with higher compensation,' he said. That's why most experts agree the trend toward higher executive pay goes hand-in-hand with a wave of hospital mergers that has led to far fewer stand-alone, community hospitals and the emergence of larger systems. In 2022, seven out of 10 hospitals were parts of larger systems, compared to just over half of hospitals in 2010. Last year, health systems announced 72 mergers, the most since 2020 when 79 were announced. St. Luke's merger with BJC was one of 65 planned in 2023. Hospitals argue that they need to merge to compete. They point to market forces like an insurance industry that controls prices and argue they will be stronger if they are bigger. When St. Luke's and BJC announced they had reached a definitive agreement to merge in late 2023, the hospitals said becoming Missouri's largest hospital system would help them recruit top talent, bolster medical research and help them address health care disparities. In reality, some economists say, the cost of care goes up when mergers reduce hospital competition. Even mergers between hospitals that don't compete in the same market can lead to higher prices for patients, some studies have found. But while there is no consensus about how hospital consolidation helps or hurts hospitals and patients, there is wide agreement about what it does to executive pay. In fact, Lawton Robert Burns, a professor of health care management at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, argues that higher CEO compensation that results from mergers is the primary driver of consolidation. 'You get bigger systems and bigger systems have bigger pay,' he said. 'It has nothing to do with quality or access or other things they say. … It's all designed to enrich themselves.' Nonprofit hospitals argue they need to pay more to attract top executive talent. They can't provide stock options like their publicly traded counterparts, but they can pay large incentive bonuses, offer housing perks and set up and fund deferred retirement plans for top executives. SERPs, also known as 'top-hat' plans, allow select employees to defer income before paying taxes. According to the Lown Institute, hospitals often fund them through cash value life insurance purchased by the hospital or company providing the plan. Similar to a 401(k) retirement plan, which is typically available to every employee in an organization, income is invested in SERPs before taxes are paid. Taxes are only due once money is withdrawn. But unlike 401(k)s and other retirement plans known as qualified plans, top-hat plans don't limit participants' annual contributions. That means the eventual payout has the potential to be much bigger. In a study of top-hat plans in private industry, the Institute for Policy Studies found marked income disparities, even between top-earning CEOs who have access to SERPs and those who don't. The study crunched the numbers for two theoretical CEOs who each invested $1 million a year over seven years. Researchers found that the CEO with a top-hat plan, who didn't have to pay taxes up front, could potentially earn $6.6 million from the investment. But the executive who had to pay income taxes before investing the money would come out with $5.3 million. Of course, a regular employee with access to a 401(k) or other tax-deferred retirement plan has far less income potential. Even if an employee has enough of their paycheck left over to invest the maximum allowed, that maximum contribution by law was only $23,000 in 2024. (Workers who are at least 50 years old can make additional catch-up contributions.) Sarah Anderson, an author of the Institute for Policy Studies' report on top-hat plans, said the disparity in retirement benefits is another example of the vast wealth gap between executives at the tops of organizations and the employees who work there. And that gap also applies to nonprofit hospitals. Until relatively recently, many employers maintained pension plans to fund employees' retirements. Employers made the financial investment, and employees were guaranteed payments once they retired. St. Luke's discontinued its pension plan at the end of 2021, according to an independent audit report. But as labor unions lost power, Anderson said, pension plans were replaced by defined benefit plans like 401(k)s 'where burden and risk is on individual employees,' she said. Meanwhile, top executives who qualify for top-hat plans have comparatively enormous retirement accounts. 'You know, there's a number beyond which it's not about food on the table or making sure your kids can afford to go to college, or even that you have a vacation home,' Saini said. 'There's a number beyond which you have all that, and at that point, what is the point?' This article first appeared on Beacon: Kansas City and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
