Secretary of Health and Human Resources William A. Hazel, Jr., M.D. announced the appointment of the Certificate of Public Need (COPN) Work Group.
The General Assembly in its 2015 session directed Secretary Hazel to create this work group, in response to questions raised about the COPN process in Virginia. The group will review the program and its impact on access to health care.
The COPN work group will be chaired by Eva Hardy, Former Senior Advisor, Dominion Resources, Inc. The Virginia Department of Health will provide staff support to the Secretary’s office for this work group, and will host access to work group materials on the department’s website (vdh.virginia.gov) beginning July 1, 2015.
COPN Work Group — Appointees
- Eva Hardy – Richmond – Former Senior Advisor, Dominion Resources, Inc.
- David H. Trump, M.D. – Richmond – Chief Deputy Commissioner, Virginia Department of Health
- Pamela Sutton-Wallace – Charlottesville – CEO, UVA Medical Center
- Mary Mannix – Fishersville – President & CEO, Augusta Health
- Richard M. Hamrick, III, M.D. – Richmond – Chief Medical Officer, HCA VA Health System
- Douglas Suddreth – Mechanicsville – VP of Development, Autumn Corporation
- J. Abbott Byrd, III, M.D. – Virginia Beach – Orthopaedic Surgeon, Atlantic Orthopaedic Specialists
- Richard A. Szucs, M.D. – Richmond – Radiologist, Commonwealth Radiology PC
- C. Burke King – Richmond – President, Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield Virginia
- Brian Keefe – Bethesda, MD – CFO of Capitol Market, Aetna Inc.
- Robert Cramer – Norfolk – Former Manager of HR Services, Norfolk Southern Corporation
- Carol Armstrong – Richmond – Manager of Benefits Administration, Southern States Cooperative
- Jill Lobb – Hampton Roads – Corporate Director of Benefits, Huntington Ingalls Industries
- Karen Cameron – Richmond – Director, Virginia Consumer Voices for Health Care
- Debbie Oswalt – Richmond – Executive Director, Virginia Health Care Foundation
- Kim Horn – Rockville, MD – President, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of Mid-Atlantic States
- William A. Hazel, Jr., MD – Richmond – Secretary of Health and Human Resources, Commonwealth of Virginia, ex officio
- Jamie Baskerville Martin – Richmond – Attorney, McCandlish Holton**
**non-voting advisor
COPN Work Group — Responsibilities
The group will review the current COPN process and the impact of the program on health care services in the Commonwealth. The group will also be exploring the need for changes to the current COPN process.
Specifically, the group is required to evaluate:
- the process by which applications for certificates of public need are reviewed, the criteria upon which decisions about issuance of COPN are based, and barriers to issuance of a COPN;
- the frequency with which applications for a certificate are approved or denied;
- fees charged for review of applications for a COPN and the cost to the Commonwealth of processing applications for a certificate of public need;
- applications for and the impact of the current COPN process on establishment of new health care services, including the establishment of new intermediate-level or specialty-level neonatal special care services and open heart surgery services and the addition of new beds or operating rooms at existing medical care facilities;
- the relationship between the COPN process and the provision of charity care in the Commonwealth and the impact of the COPN process on the provision of charity care in the Commonwealth;
- the impact of the COPN process on graduate medical education programs and teaching hospitals in the Commonwealth;
- the efficacy of regional health planning agencies, the role of regional health planning agencies in the COPN process, and barriers to the continued role of regional health planning agencies in the COPN need process; and
- the frequency with which the State Medical Facilities Plan is updated and whether such plan should be updated more frequently.
The initial meeting of the COPN work group will be held on July 1st from 1 to 4 p.m., in House Room C of the General Assembly Building. The second meeting will be held on September 28th from 1 to 4 p.m. in Boardroom 4 on the Second Floor of the Perimeter Center, located at 9960 Mayland Drive in Richmond. The final meeting of the group will be held in late October. A final report will be provided to the House Appropriations and Senate Finance Committees by December 1, 2015.
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