Last week, the Commonwealth Court ruled that Brandywine, Jennersville, and Phoenixville hospitals, all currently or formerly owned by Tower Health, are not eligible for property-tax exemptions, writes Harold Brubaker for The Philadelphia Inquirer. 

These decisions represent a significant victory for Avon Grove, Coatesville Area, and Phoenixville Area school districts, three of the four school districts that have filed separate suits against Tower Health. 

The three school districts received a favorable lower court ruling from Judge Jeffrey R. Sommer of the Chester County Court of Common Pleas in October 2021.

However, Sommer found out that the hospitals did not qualify for the exemption because they do not provide enough free services, their services businesses are too intertwined with doctors at for-profit practices, and that they do not operate without private profit motives. 

Tower Health appealed the rulings and said his opinion should be tossed as it was riddled with factual and procedural errors. 

But while the Commonwealth Court agreed that there were errors in the opinion, it did not deem any of them fatal to Sommer’s ruling. 

“We find no error in the trial court’s reasoning,” wrote Judge Christine Fizzano Cannon. 

Read more about the Tower Health property-tax case in The Philadelphia Inquirer.