Health Services Management, Inc. v. Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee

791 S.W.2d 732, 1990 Mo. App. LEXIS 547, 1990 WL 40377
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedApril 10, 1990
DocketNos. WD 41872, WD 41873
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 791 S.W.2d 732 (Health Services Management, Inc. v. Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Health Services Management, Inc. v. Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee, 791 S.W.2d 732, 1990 Mo. App. LEXIS 547, 1990 WL 40377 (Mo. Ct. App. 1990).

Opinion

SHANGLER, Judge.

This review is of a summary judgment entered by the same court in each of two separate actions for declaratory judgment on the same question of law. In each case the circuit court entered the summary declaration that the petitioner was entitled to a certificate of need for a new health care facility under § 197.330.2, RSMo Cum. Supp.1989 by operation of law.

Appeal was taken from each entry of summary judgment and they are consolidated by our order. The declaratory judgment action in each ease is a sequel to an antecedent decision of this court, and is more easily understood in terms of that succession. We defer the delineation of the parties, their postures in the litigations, and the ultimate issues for our decision until after that preface.

INTRODUCTION

West County Care Center, Inc. v. Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee, 773 S.W.2d 474 (Mo.App.1989) involved an application by Health Services Management Corporation to the Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee under § 197.315 for a certificate of need for a new intermediate health facility. The law prescribes that the Review Committee act to approve or deny such an application within 130 days of its presentation. § 197.330.1(5). The neglect to issue decision within that period constitutes approval and final administrative action on the certificate of need. § 197.330.2. Notwithstanding, the Review Committee deferred decision until after the passage of the 130 days.

After the expiration of that period, West County Care Center, Inc., a competitor fa[734]*734cility — and so an affected person by the definition of the statute — brought prohibition to restrain the Review Committee from any further administrative action on the application for certificate of need. The opinion determined that under the certificate of need law a competitor affected person is a stranger to all but the information gathering phase of the certificate of need law, and so had no interest sufficient to prohibit the agency from postponing the decision on the certificate of need of another applicant. Id. at 476. That opinion, a decision of our court en banc, overruled the prior decision of a panel of our court in State ex rel. Missouri Health Care Ass’n. v. Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee, 768 S.W.2d 559 (Mo.App.1988), which held that the status of competitor affected person sufficed to invest standing for a writ of prohibition to restrain the agency from decision on the certificate of need more than 130 days after application.

The two summary judgments under review are adjuncts of those decisions.

Health Services Management, Inc. v. Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee and Community Care Center of Festus, No. WD 41872, is an action for declaratory judgment by Health Services Management, the same applicant for certificate of need in the same project considered by us in West County, that the neglect of the Review Committee to enter a decision within 130 days after presentation of the application operated by law as approval of the certificate of need under § 197.330.2. The appeal to us from the summary judgment in favor of Health Services Management is taken by Festus, an inter-venor/competitor affected person. [The Review Committee now also appeals after grant by our special order. Rule 81.07]

Missouri Health Care Ass’n and Barnes Hosp. vs. Missouri Health Facilities Review Comm., No. WD 41873,1 is an action for declaratory judgment by Barnes Hospital, intervenor/applicant in the Missouri Health Care Ass’n case, that the neglect of the Review Committee to enter a decision within 130 days after presentation of the application operated by law as approval of the certificate of need under § 197.330.2. The appeal to us from the summary judgment in favor of Barnes Hospital is taken by Missouri Health Care Ass’n, an inter-venor/competitor affected person. [The Review Committee also appeals after grant of our special order. Rule 81.07]

ISSUES ON APPEAL

In case No. WD 41872, the applicant Health Services Management seeks to dismiss the appeal of intervenor/competitor affected person Festus. In case No. WD 41873, the applicant Barnes Hospital seeks to dismiss the appeal of inter-venor/competitor affected persons Missouri Health Care Association. The motions assert that a competitor affected person lacks interest in the agency action to defer decision on the application for certificate of need beyond the time allowed by law, that such an affected person is not aggrieved by a judgment that the certificate vested to an applicant by operation of law, and hence is without standing to litigate or appeal the question. The grounds of the motion are reasserted as a point on appeal, both in case No. WD 41872 and in case No. WD 41873.

In each of the cases also, the Review Committee, as appellant under Rule 81.07, claims trial error in the entry of summary judgment that the certificate of need application of Health Services Management Corporation and of Barnes Hospital was approved by operation of law under § 197.330.2.

DISCUSSION

In West County [at 476] our court en banc determined that a competitor affected person is a stranger to all but the information gathering phase of the certificate of need proceedings. Accordingly, such an affected person was adjudicated as without standing to test the jurisdiction of the Review Committee to postpone decision on the application for a certificate of need beyond [735]*735the statutory review schedule of § 197.330. None of the interests protected to a competitor affected person by the certificate of need law are at issue in this litigation. See § 197.330.1(2), (3), (5), (6), and West County at 475. Nor does the adjudication that the postponed agency decision operated by law to approve the certificate of need to each applicant create an interest in a competitor that lacked theretofore, and hence, an aggrievement for appeal. It is emphatic, rather, that the right to appeal the question of approval by operation of law is withheld from a competitor affected person. § 197.330.2; West County at 476; Missouri Health Care Ass’n v. Missouri Health Facilities Review Comm., 777 S.W.2d 241, 242[1] (Mo.App.1989).

On oral argument in these consolidated appeals Festus and Missouri Health Care Ass’n asserted that, the holding in West County that denies them standing as to all but the information gathering phase of the licensure procedure notwithstanding, they are interested as taxpayers to protect against unlawful expenditures of public funds, and so have standing to appeal the summary judgments that the certificates to the applicants Health Service Management and Barnes were approved by operation of law.

Indeed, a taxpayer who alleges that public funds are expended for an illegal purpose describes a private injury sufficient to maintain a declaratory judgment and injunction against the illegal action. Missourians for Separation of Church and State v. Robertson, 592 S.W.2d 825, 837[10,11] (Mo.App.1979).

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791 S.W.2d 732, 1990 Mo. App. LEXIS 547, 1990 WL 40377, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/health-services-management-inc-v-missouri-health-facilities-review-moctapp-1990.