Community Forum: Hospitals must analyze value of participation in UVM Health Network
September 18, 2025
By Chris Pearson
Vermont Healthcare 911 (VHC911) is a broad coalition united to combat the high cost of healthcare in Vermont. The coalition is comprised of business owners, labor leaders, healthcare providers, civic and political leaders of all parties and represents over 200,000 Vermonters.
Following the Sept. 12 hospital budget decisions by the Green Mountain Care Board, VHC911 leaders are calling into question the value of the University of Vermont Health Network (the Network) and whether or not it is serving Vermont hospitals and the Vermont population well.
We can’t find evidence that the UVM Health Network has been a worthwhile investment for Vermont or our hospitals. In fact, Friday’s decision from hospital regulators makes it clear the Network has drained resources from our state to prop up hospitals in New York at the same time it has stripped control from local hospital boards. All of this is against a backdrop of Vermonters’ paying the most expensive health insurance premiums in the country.
VHC911’s Leadership Council is co-chaired by retired Vermont Business Roundtable President Lisa Ventriss. She said local hospitals boards need to more forcefully defend their own hospitals against the Network and its practices. “We are calling on the UVM Medical Center board of directors to stand up to the Network board that clearly calls the shots,” Ventriss said. “It’s time for someone to put Vermont patients and the needs of the Medical Center ahead of the Network’s bottom line, and I think that work should start with UVMMC’s own board, today.”
Former Gov. Jim Douglas is the group’s co-chair with Ventriss. He extended the theme to other hospital boards within the Network. “We urge the boards at Porter and Central Vermont Medical Center, as well as the UVM Medical Center, to take a hard look at the data,” Gov. Douglas said. “It is time for an analysis of whether or not their hospitals and our communities are well served by participating in the UVM Health Network.”
VHC911 points to one quote, among many they say, from Green Mountain Care Board chair Owen Foster who described why the UVM Medical Center would not receive the budget increase they requested: “First, the University of Vermont Health Network deprives the University of Vermont Medical Center of over a hundred million dollars by using Vermont reserves to pay New York hospital expenses. In fact, the University of Vermont Health Network took over $10 million from Vermont to cover New York expenses in the same year that the Health Network cut essential services in Vermont.”
We’ve had the UVM Health Network for over a decade now. We are asking that hospital boards reflect and make public their understanding of how it’s going. From the outside, it would seem things aren’t moving in the right direction and it may be time to call the question of whether or not the state is well served by participating in the UVM Health Network.
Chris Pearson, VHC911 Board Chair