Planned Parenthood May Close Hays Clinic Next Week After Losing Tax Dollars 
Hays, Kansas - A Planned Parenthood referral clinic in Hays, Kansas, that sees just over 900 people annually is slated to close on September 2, 2011, unless Planned Parenthood received a guarantee that Title X tax money will be restored. Earlier this year, Kansas passed a law that allowed the state to reprioritize the distribution of Title X family planning funds to legitimate clinics and hospitals. Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri had been receiving $330,000 in public funds annually. This year those funds were disbursed to other clinics and hospitals that can supply family planning services without any ties to abortion. Planned Parenthood is now trying to use the courts to get that money back. Last month, Federal Judge Thomas Marten ordered that the tax dollars be restored to Planned Parenthood even though the state had no existing contract with the state's largest supplier of abortions. Planned Parenthood had argued that losing the public funds would cause "irreparable harm" and argued that all the money was used to keep non-abortion clinics open in Hays and Wichita. That ruling is on appeal. "Planned Parenthood sees Title X money as their private entitlement program. Planned Parenthood has no right to demand that the people fork over their hard-earned tax money to keep their failing abortion business afloat," said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman. "If Planned Parenthood has to close clinics because business cannot support them, that is their problem, not the tax-payers'." Hays and Wichita clinics act as "feeder clinics" for the abortion clinic located in Overland Park. They solicit customers, sell them abortions, and schedule the clients for the procedure. These feeder clinics are integral components to Planned Parenthood's abortion business. Without their abortion marketing programs and referrals, abortions done in Overland Park would decline. It is disingenuous to claim the "feeder clinics" have nothing to do with Planned Parenthood's abortion business. "Because of their important role of Planned Parenthood's abortion business, these clinics should not qualify for Federal Funding through Title X," said Newman. "The truth is that other medical facilities are perfectly qualified to provide legitimate family planning services to communities, and are now doing so, but Planned Parenthood is wrongly trying to scare the public with the false claim that people will be without needed medical care if they don't get our tax money. That simply is not true." Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri has struggled since being charged with 107 criminal counts in 2007. That case is scheduled for a preliminary hearing in October.
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