Kadner: Health advocate wants voters to decide on sales tax

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Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle (left) looks on as Tya Robinson-May testifies during a hearing on Oak Forest Hospital at City Hall in Oak Forest, IL on Thursday, July 14, 2011. | Matt Marton~Sun-Times Media

Updated: March 11, 2012 8:47AM

I’m a sucker for people fighting for a lost cause.

Maybe I’ve watched “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” too many times or spent too many years cheering for Chicago sports teams that didn’t have a chance.

No matter the reason, Tya Robinson-May is fighting a battle she has no chance of winning, and I can’t resist spreading the word.

Robinson-May is launching a petition drive to place a referendum measure on the November election ballot to reinstate a half-cent sales tax increase in Cook County. She wants the money to be used to reopen Oak Forest Hospital and provide additional money for Stroger and Provident hospitals.

Opposition to a 1-percentage-point sales tax hike during the administration of Cook County Board President Todd Stroger was so loud that voters eventually tossed him out of office.

The county board repealed half of that increase, and Toni Preckwinkle was elected to replace Stroger after vowing she would get rid of the rest of it.

But Cook County found itself short of funds, and as part of a health system reform and budget-cutting plan, it closed Oak Forest Hospital, which served the indigent in south Cook County.

Robinson-May, a former nurse at Oak Forest, opposed the plan to close the hospital and became an advocate for the patients there. She testified at hearings and gave interviews to TV and newspaper reporters.

I told her then that she was fighting for a lost cause, but she said she didn’t care.

“If people knew that for a half cent on the dollar lives could be saved,” Robinson-May told me, “they would never have supported the tax cut. They thought the county was going to cut waste. They didn’t think hospitals were going to be closed or services cut.”

I told her that if people had a vote on where cuts should be made, they might have suggested different areas in the government budget.

“Then we should give them a chance to vote,” she said. “Let the people decide if they want to spend a half cent to save the lives of sick people.”

She made that comment before a state hearing on the closing of Oak Forest Hospital, and I just chalked it off to wishful thinking.

After a state board approved the closing of the hospital, Cook County turned the facility into an intermediate-care clinic for outpatients only. The fight to save the hospital was lost.

But Robinson-May is refusing to quit.

“I need to collect 170,000 signatures on a petition to put the sales tax referendum on the ballot,” she told me during a telephone call this week. “I’m going to have the petitions available at my church, Bethel Church in Harvey, every Friday starting (today) from 7 to 9 p.m. We’re going to restore Oak Forest Hospital.”

The petition states: “Election Board Ballot Initiative and Referendum Petition to Re-Open Cook County, Illinois, Oak Forest Hospital for Inpatient Care.”

It continues: “We the undersigned voters of Cook County, Illinois do hereby vote and petition for this Election Board Ballot and Referendum for the Re-Opening of Cook County, Oak Forest Hospital, providing full services, in-patient care, medical surgical unit, intensive care unit, heart and cardiovascular unit, pulmonary/vent unit, medical and surgical unit, emergency dept., re-open all surgical units, long-term care rehabilitation unit, emergency room and fully staffed with 213 beds.

“Also, half cent sales tax increase to fund Oak Forest Hospital, Provident Hospital and John Stroger Hospital operation budgets.”

For the petitions to be honored, they must be signed only by registered voters in Cook County. In addition, each signature must be witnessed, and the person who does so must sign the petitions in front of a notary public.

Some lawyers make a living challenging the validity of election petitions in Illinois, and if Robinson-May doesn’t get it right, it won’t matter how many signatures she collects.

But even if she gets those 170,000 signatures, even if they’re all valid, the chance of that referendum measure getting voter approval has got to be more than 100-to-1.

By the way, in the interest of full disclosure, I should point out that Robinson-May remains a Cook County nurse, working out of the courthouse in Markham. I don’t believe she’s doing this for personal gain, but I’m sure there are those who would say she stands to benefit from any increase in Cook County revenue.

I’d respond that by opposing one of Preckwinkle’s health care reforms, the closing of Oak Forest Hospital, Robinson-May is putting herself at risk.

“I believe in the people,” she said. “They will do the right thing if given the chance.

“Your headline should read: Let the people decide, not the county commissioners.”