District court finds proposed Iowa women's health facility does not need state approval

On October 18, the US District Court for the Southern District of Iowa ordered the Iowa Department of Health to withdraw its demand that Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa obtain a "certificate of need" in order to open a new facility in Davenport. Judge Charles R. Wolle found that state officials had deliberately misused the certificate of need requirement--a policy originally created to allow communities to influence health care standards at local facilities and prevent duplication of medical services--to block the clinic, which far from providing duplicative services would become the only provider of abortions in the Quad Cities. For at least 10 years, no family planning facility in Iowa has been required to obtain a certificate of need, in large part because the review standards are generally regarded as obsolete. The application process would have required Planned Parenthood to publicly disclose its sources of funding, identify the intended site of the facility, and pay a substantial fee; it would also have involved a public hearing at which members of the community could object to the clinic. The court concluded that state officials could not justify applying the requirements to a facility providing abortions when it had routinely failed to apply them to other clinics that offer the same services but do not provide abortions. Judge Wolle further ruled that the state's order for a certificate of need imposes a substantial obstacle to access to abortion that is unjustified by any government interest--and therefore unconstitutional under the standards established by the US Supreme Court in Planned Parenthood vs. Casey. Planned Parenthood Federation of America is representing the plaintiffs in Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa vs. Atchison.