McHenry County Blog

With the face of Crystal Lake’s Gay Games’ cheerleader Mayor Aaron Shepley as its spokesman, Centegra Health Systems bemoaned its failure to receive permission to begin open-heart surgery.

The reason for the rejection?

Competition would be unhealthy for neighboring hospitals like Good Shepherd (where my wife used to work).

How ironic.

Centegra’s used the same argument to drive a stake through the heart of Mercy Health System’s plan to put a competing hospital in Shepley’s home town (with Shepley working actively to kill it and in the courtroom when the decision was handed down).

But, by losing by a 2-2 vote, I’m sure the Mayor will try to find someone like vacationing Crystal Lake Park Board President Jerry Sullivan to come to the next meeting and try to reverse the decision, the same way Sullivan brought the Gay Games Regatta to Crystal Lake.

The board is short one member with the resignation of chairman Glenn Poshard.

Think some of the old timers are wishing for the days when former Centegra Board member (and now convicted felon) Don Udstuen was still around? His influence might have been useful on this Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board that used to be so corrupt that all of its members were kicked off in a legislative re-organization after the Mercy Hospital and Edward Hospital corruption was publicized.

Of course, if my bill of the early 1990’s had passed, the board would have been abolished then.

Why on earth anyone thinks that this Soviet-style central planning will work in health care in Illinois, when it works nowhere else, is beyond my understanding.