Hospital is taking advantage of Winfield

Hospitals are supposed to make things better, but Central DuPage Hospital is making them worse in Winfield. CDH is not run by nuns taking in laundry to be able to afford bandages; it is one of the most profitable hospitals in the state. After paying its bills and high executive salaries, every day of the year it adds almost half-a-million dollars into its savings accounts (some off shore).

Also every day, taxpayer costs for extra police time, false alarms, road repairs, etc., from CDH keep running up. Winfield taxpayers subsidize that wealthy enterprise.

Some hospitals pay taxes, CDH pays lawyers for loopholes. Because it is so profitable, CDH was bought by Northwestern University's medical arm. By threatening to leave untreated for years that open wound created when their cash cow bought and demolished the major part of downtown, the new bullies try to extort Winfield to exempt CDH from normal regulation, including zoning and building plan reviews on its extensive real estate portfolio.

Our mayor is the first one in history to get CDH to pay anything at all toward what it is costing our taxpayers. CDH now demands that the taxpayers lease an unwanted office building from it for 50 years, with a $3 million upfront payment.

A parasite ends up killing its host. Winfield is facing tough times due to rising pension costs, its small tax base and an important revenue source going away. Hospitals are supposed to do no harm. CDH is harming our civic health. When will Northwest Medicine start curing, instead of spreading, its infection?

Stan Zegel

Winfield