Staff Reports
It’s clear Bayfront Health St. Petersburg doesn’t like property taxes. For the third year in a row, the hospital is suing the Pinellas County Property Appraiser’s Office over its tax bill, which the Community Health System hospital thinks is too high.
The hospital was taxed on a $66 million valuation on its city-owned property, which it leases from St. Petersburg. The hospital claims the valuation is “excessive.”
Bayfront filed similar lawsuits in 2019 and 2018 in which they also claimed “excessive” valuations.
Both of those lawsuits are ongoing and the Property Appraiser’s Office is defending its numbers.
The for-profit hospital, which is part of the massive Community Health Systems chain, paid its $1.3 million tax bill for 2017, but asked the courts to force the county to reevaluate the property’s taxable worth.
The Valuation Board lowered its 2017 valuation to $62.3 million, but the hospital still sued.
They’re making the same request for 2020’s valuation.
In 2019, the hospital sued despite the property appraiser lowering its tax assessment from $65 million to $60 million after Bayfront protested its valuation with the agency’s Value Adjustment Board.
Bayfront has had a series of potential setbacks.
St. Petersburg City Council members grilled the hospital’s Interim CEO Joe Mullany last year about the hospital’s performance after a series of reports signaled possible trouble.
Earlier in the year, the University of South Florida announced it was cutting ties with Bayfront after a three year trial partnership with the hospital. There were also reports of more than 400 layoffs at the hospital.
Council members questioned whether the hospital was a good long term partner. Community Health Systems has been in financial despair in recent years and has closed several of its under-performing hospitals including Bayfront Health Dade City, which it sold.
Still, the hospital provides significant indigent care. Bayfront reportedly provided more than $73 million worth of services to patients unable to pay in 2017, according to the Tampa Bay Times. By comparison, nearby St. Anthony’s Hospital provided just $20 million worth of indigent care the same year.
Bayfront is a 480-bed for-profit hospital and its Tennessee-based parent company is a publicly traded company.
Community Health Systems operates 99 affiliated hospitals in 17 states. It also has hospitals in Brooksville, Crystal River and Spring Hill.
