Autumn at Planned Parenthood

An Update on Facilities and Funding at the Nation's Largest Abortion Performer and Promoter

By Laura Antkowiak

This fall brings mixed news of Planned Parenthood's moves at the local level. Planned Parenthood of Pasadena has had to delay indefinitely the opening of a facility in Monrovia, California, but Planned Parenthood's relentless expansion of its abortion business in Iowa continued.

Meanwhile, the FBI determined that a Kansas abortion facility did not illegally profit when it provided fetal tissue to researchers, according to the Associated Press. Planned Parenthood's loss of state funding in Missouri has prompted it to close another office, but it says it intends resume abortions at its Columbia facility.

As a bonus, the box entitled "Your Tax Dollars At Work" shown below reports the latest government-released information on federal money supporting Planned Parenthood Federation of America and its affiliates.

Monrovia, California

Planned Parenthood's abortion-performing Pasadena affiliate has run into an unusual roadblock in attempting to open its third facility. According to the Pasadena Star News, the City of Monrovia, California, is considering redevelopment plans for the land on which the nearly completed facility is located. Opening of the Planned Parenthood clinic has now been suspended.

The surrounding land has been part of a redevelopment zone since - - coincidentally - - 1973. Office buildings rise from three corners of the intersection of Huntington and Myrtle, and the city had long hoped to build on the fourth corner, according to the Star News.

Now that the closing of a gas station has lowered the price of the land on the fourth corner, Monrovia would like to purchase the land, reports Star News staff writer Lisa Faught. It would then raze the buildings currently located on that land - - the gas station, Winston Tire Co., The Hitch Depot, and Planned Parenthood - - to make room for one or two office buildings.

City manager Don Hopper told the Star News, "This is not about trying to eliminate Planned Parenthood because of the controversy surrounding it, but rather . . . an economic opportunity to fulfill our long-term plans."

Pro-life citizens, organized as Monrovians Against Planned Parenthood (MAPP), had worked hard to keep Planned Parenthood out of their city since learning of the proposed expansion last November. They "flooded the city" with letters, sponsored rallies, studied reports from the health department, and raised possible code violations in a lawsuit against the city. According to the Star News, however, Hopper said that the city's motives were purely economic in considering redevelopment on Planned Parenthood's land.

"If it means Planned Parenthood is not going to be in the city, that's great," the president of MAPP, John O'Neill, told the Star News.

Monrovia's decision came as a surprise, the Star News reports, to Planned Parenthood of Pasadena (PPP), an ambitious affiliate of the nation's largest abortion performer. The affiliate had purchased the site for the Monrovia clinic with money raised through its "Special Expansion Drive." Additionally, the affiliate received 61% of its budget for 1999-2000 from federal, state, and local dollars, according to PPP's annual report.

The affiliate's web site tells potential customers that, "In California, minors do not need a parent's consent for prevention or treatment of pregnancy [emphasis added]..." It promises free or low-cost services to low-income individuals, and links to sites that show how to reach its centers by public transportation. PPP's 1999-2000 annual report notes that of its pregnancy testing clients who tested positive, "only 32% made an immediate decision to terminate the pregnancy." It is unclear whether PPP considers this good or bad.

Planned Parenthood of Pasadena also emphasizes pro-abortion activism. In addition to its lobbying and organizing activities, PPP Board Chair George A. Brumder's message in PPP's annual report states that the affiliate in 1999-2000 "recruited waiting room advocates to encourage clients to register to vote, join the Responsible Actions Network... and spread positive word of our work."

"We're back to square one, in a sense," Brumder told the Star News. "We don't have the ability to negotiate whether we stay or not."

Council Bluffs, Iowa

Planned Parenthood announced last September that its facility in Council Bluffs, Iowa, would begin performing abortions. This action would make the facility the fifth in the state of Iowa and the third in the Omaha, Nebraska, metro area to do abortions.

Planned Parenthood of Omaha-Council Bluffs projected to begin abortions in early October. Its spokesperson, Beverly Nolte, told the Des Moines Register that the affiliate had hoped to perform abortions at the clinic sooner, but the terrorist attacks delayed the shipment of needed supplies to the clinic.

Planned Parenthood has expanded abortion "services" in Iowa at an urgent pace of late. The Council Bluffs facility will be the third Planned Parenthood center in the state to begin performing abortions since 1999.

Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri Fetal Tissue Sale

Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri (PPKM) continues to make national headlines. In 2000, it was reported on ABC's 20/20 that the affiliate had been providing the tissue of unborn children killed at its Overland Park, Kansas, abortion facility to researchers and receiving money from entities to whom the tissue was provided.

This September, the Associated Press reported the FBI's conclusion that the abortion facility had not broken any laws. The AP story says that current law permits the facility to charge researchers for the tissue in order to recover the costs of removing and shipping the babies' tissue.

The investigation into the situation began when one of the researchers with whom the facility had contracted, Miles Jones, ignored a subpoena to appear before the House Health and Environment Subcommittee.

The March 9, 2000, Kansas City Star paraphrases PPKM President Peter Brownlie as saying that Planned Parenthood did not "collect excessive amounts" from selling fetal tissue. This report noted that the Overland Park facility no longer removed fetal tissue, having terminated its arrangements with Jones and with another firm, the Anatomic Gift Foundation, over concern about the prices charged, fees paid, and other business practices. Brownlie told the Star that the facility might begin extracting fetal tissue again in the future, however.

Clinic Comings and Goings

The affiliate also has been struggling with the financial blow it has taken following the Missouri legislature's repeated votes to deny state funding to organizations that perform or refer for abortions.

The Columbia Daily Tribune reported that PPKM would close its Fulton facility on Halloween. Brownlie blames the action on pro- life lawmakers, saying that deficits mounted and staff and services had to be cut at the Fulton office because of PPKM's legal battles with the state and the loss of the $630,000 in annual funding that the group would have received.

According to the Daily Tribune, Planned Parenthood intended to refer Fulton clients to its offices in Jefferson City, where it would begin to offer longer hours, and in Columbia. In early October, Brownlie announced that abortions would resume at the Columbia facility, but did not give a date for when this would occur, the Daily Tribune and the Missourian reported.

In response to Missouri's votes to defund abortion performers, which were ultimately upheld by the courts in 1999, Planned Parenthood had stopped performing abortions in Columbia in that same year. Though the office will receive no state money, the Missourian reported that a local donor's gift to Planned Parenthood would make the resumption of abortions possible.

Your Tax Dollars at Work

Federal Money Supporting Planned Parenthood

FY 2000 FY 1999

Family Planning Grants $54,578,663 $51,051,270

Medicaid $42,058,942 $38,933,177

Social Services $21,603,526 $17,354,752

BlockGrants

Maternal and ChildHealth $4,819,161 $5,115,032

Services Block Grants

Other Federal Programs $14,277,432 $13,297,693

Total $137,337,724 $125,751,924

Source:U.S. General Accounting Office, November 13, 2001.

The Department of Health and Human Services paid out the bulk of this money. The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and the House Committee on Energy and Commerce authorized most of these programs. Even if PPFA cannot use federal funds directly to pay for abortions, this money frees up other resources from individual and corporate donations and clinic income for performing and promoting abortion.