Women's Community Health Center of Beaumont, Inc. v. Texas Health Facilities Commission

685 F.2d 974, 1982 U.S. App. LEXIS 25626
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedSeptember 15, 1982
Docket81-1180
StatusPublished
Cited by21 cases

This text of 685 F.2d 974 (Women's Community Health Center of Beaumont, Inc. v. Texas Health Facilities Commission) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Women's Community Health Center of Beaumont, Inc. v. Texas Health Facilities Commission, 685 F.2d 974, 1982 U.S. App. LEXIS 25626 (5th Cir. 1982).

Opinion

REAVLEY, Circuit Judge:

The question presented is whether the Younger doctrine bars this action for declaratory and injunctive relief against the state’s attempt to enforce the “certificate of need” requirements of the Texas Health Planning Act (the “State Act”), Tex.Rev. Civ.Stat.Ann. art. 4418h (Vernon 1976 & Supp.1982), and the National Health Planning and Resources Development Act of 1974 (the “Federal Act”), 42 U.S.C.A. §§ 300k to 300n-6 (West Supp.1982). We conclude that it does and affirm the judgment of the district court.

I. History of the Litigation

The Women’s Community Health Center, a medical facility offering first trimester abortions, pregnancy counseling, and related health care, opened in Beaumont, Texas, in October 1978. On December 15, 1978, the Texas Health Facilities Commission (the “Commission”) notified the Center that it appeared to be operating in violation of the State Act. That Act requires a person to obtain a “certificate of need” from the Commission before opening a “health care facility.” 1 The Center had not applied for a certificate of need.

On July 10,1979, the Commission filed an action against the Center in state district court in Beaumont, asking the court to enjoin the Center from operating “unless and until the Center obtains a Certificate of Need from the ... Commission.” The Commission’s petition alleged that despite repeated assurances from the Center, including a promise that the application for a certificate of need would be filed within 15 days of March 15, 1979, the Center had failed to file its application for a certificate of need. 2

The Center eventually filed an application in late July 1979. The Commission thereafter ceased active pursuit of the injunction and instead commenced administrative proceedings on the Center’s application. Nevertheless, the enforcement action was not dismissed; it remained (and remains) pending in state court.

After accepting the Center’s application for a certificate of need in January 1980, 3 the Commission referred the application to the Greater East Texas Health Systems Agency (“GETHSA”), the “health systems agency” created by the Federal Act, and charged by that Act with improving health care in the Center’s locality. See 42 U.S. C.A. §§ 3007 — 1(b)(1), 3007-2(a) (West Supp. 1982). 4 In late February 1980, GETHSA recommended to the Commission that the Center’s application be approved. 5

In March 1980, the Commission conducted a public hearing on the Center’s application. The hearing officer found, inter alia, that the Center was “not necessary to meet the health care requirements of the medical *977 service area,” that the Center would “adversely affect, [would] unnecessarily and uneconomieally duplicate and [would] not integrate with existing health care facilities and services presently offered in the medical service area,” and that the Center was “not less costly, more effective, and more appropriate than other facilities or services which are available.” Accepting these fact findings, the Commission denied the Center’s application on August 1, 1980. In denying the Center’s motion for a rehearing on September 12,1980, the Commission also found that the Center had been violating the State Act by operating without a certificate of need and “requested] the Attorney General of Texas to continue the legal action already instituted [in Beaumont] against the Center to enjoin a continuing violation of the ... Act.”

On October 9, 1980, the Center and the other appellants — two medical doctors and three pregnant women — -brought this action in the United States district court against the Commission, its members, and the Attorney General of Texas. Six days later, the Center filed a second action in state district court: a petition to review the decision of the Commission. The appellants aver that the petition “was filed solely as a protective appeal to guard against a state statute of limitations”; the Center moved to stay that appeal on the same day it was filed. 6

In March 1981, the federal district court granted defendants’ motion to dismiss. Thereafter, plaintiffs filed their notice of appeal. The defendant Commission filed an amended petition in its enforcement proceeding in the state district court, renewing its request for an injunction against the Center’s continuing operation. The state district court stayed the enforcement action pending our decision of this appeal.

Throughout these proceedings, the Center has remained open and has continued to perform first trimester abortions. 7

II. Abstention

A. Nature of the Plaintiffs’ Claim

The plaintiffs do not claim that a “healthcare facility” that performs first trimester abortions cannot constitutionally be required to obtain a certificate of need. Instead, plaintiffs’ federal claim is that de *978 fendants have attempted to apply the certificate of need requirement to the Center in a discriminatory fashion, thereby transgressing the constitutional limitations on the state’s power to regulate first trimester abortions established in Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 163-64, 93 S.Ct. 705, 731-32, 35 L.Ed.2d 147 (1973). Plaintiffs argue that the defendants have made the “arbitrary and capricious” determinations (1) that the Center is a “health-care facility” as defined in the State Act and (2) that the Center is not entitled to a certificate of need. Plaintiffs also append the state law claim on which this federal constitutional claim logically rests — that the Commission’s actions were arbitrary and capricious, contrary to the State Act, and not supported by substantial evidence in the record. Should the court conclude that the Commission’s actions conformed to the State Act, however, the plaintiffs advance a supremacy clause claim: they argue that the Commission’s application of the State Act is contrary to the Federal Act which it implements. See Tex.Rev.Civ.Stat.Ann. art. 4418h, § 1.02 (Vernon 1982). 8

Plaintiffs sought, inter alia, declaratory relief in accord with these arguments, and an injunction either (1) restraining the Commission from requiring a certificate of need, or (2) directing the Commission to grant a certificate of need. They further requested a preliminary injunction to restrain the defendants from enforcing the certificate of need requirement. Such relief would, of course, bar the state from prosecuting its enforcement proceeding in state district court.

B. The Younger Doctrine

In a series of cases beginning with Younger v. Harris,

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Bluebook (online)
685 F.2d 974, 1982 U.S. App. LEXIS 25626, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/womens-community-health-center-of-beaumont-inc-v-texas-health-ca5-1982.