Hospital Boards Must Analyze Value of Participation in UVM Health Network
VHC911 - Stat v.19
Since January, VHC911 has offered the public and policy makers a combination of data analytics and questions about hospital governance in our drive to understand why health insurance and healthcare costs in Vermont are so high, how we got here, and how we can turn things around.
In recent weeks, our analyses of state hospital costs and expenditures, generated from credible public sources, have been vindicated by Mike Smith and his “Liaison Team” who have open access to internal data from the University of Vermont Health Network (the Network, for short). In an August 29 memo The Liaison Team stated: “UVMMC expense growth is at an unsustainable rate of 9.8% annually and that means that the Network expense growth is also unsustainable. UVMMC expenses have increased on a VT per capita basis by 53% (2019 to 2024). Administrative costs are a large portion of these costs (21%).” In addition, the memo detailed $68.9M in loans from UVMMC to New York Network hospitals and another $20M in affiliation agreements, capital investments and population health initiatives. “While it is possible that the loans have been forgiven, it is unlikely that they have been repaid.” Read the full memo here.
On Friday September 12, Vermont's healthcare regulator – the Green Mountain Care Board (GMCB) – spent considerable time describing the damaging financial impact of the Network on Vermont hospitals and ratepayers.
GMCB Chair Owen Foster: “The University of Vermont Health Network does not provide health care; it’s essentially an expensive and ineffective layer of overpriced and unnecessary corporate bureaucracy that has proven itself physically and spiritually distant and unconnected from the mission of our flagship academic medical center and the needs of Vermonters.” Chair Foster characterized the UVMHN leadership as “irresponsible stewards of Vermonter’s health care dollars” and the flow of cash from UVMMC to the Health Network as a “corporate shell game.” If you have 25 minutes, it's worth watching Foster's entire presentation.
What emerged during the hearing is an alarming picture of three local hospitals – UVMMC, Central Vermont Medical Center (CVMC) and Porter – operating under the umbrella of the Network and compelled by Network executives to serve two masters: the people of Vermont and the Network’s business model. There is no question now that Vermonters paying high commercial insurance premiums and high deductibles are coming out on the losing end of this deal.
VHC911 leaders believe it's time to re-think the value and necessity of the Network. To that end we issued the press release below on September 15, 2025, calling on the boards of directors at UVMMC, CVMC and Porter to take a hard look at the findings of the GMCB and the Liaison team and determine if the Network delivers real and sustainable value, financial and medical, to their Vermont hospitals and to all of us in the Green Mountains.
VHC911: Hospital Boards Must Analyze Value of Participation
in UVM Health Network
BURLINGTON, VT - 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 September 12, 2025 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," said VHC911 board chair, Chris Pearson. "In fact," he continued, "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 Vermonter's 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. Ventriss 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. 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 Governor 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. 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," said Pearson. "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."
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