thank you and good morning at least the court counsel there are indeed three cases of which there are three issues one common to all three cases the second issue under the policy manual the question is whether or not there was a factor for market value received but in this case very specifically the policy manual that pm zero seven zero two zero eight deep addresses prepaid contracts funded by life insurance in which the department's own policy reads disregard the prepaid very contract funded by a life insurance policy when ownership a life insurance policy has been irrevocably assign if the total value of the funeral goods and services to be set received at the time of death is comparable to the face value of the life insurance policy fair market value has been received mr younger clients  not necessarily to contract directly with a funeral home provider but to enter into an irrevocable trust the fund for the disposition of the remains of that but under the terms of the trusts the heirs of your client no bell for the funeral was presented within forty five days that that's true but under what circumstances could that possibly happen i mean the more important point is that the this whole thousand is still available and that will pass to the children even that is provided for in the statute the statute we're referring to provides that even the let me find it so it's a little bit out of order for me even when there is a very a contract the statutes specifically provide said if there's any monies left over it will go to the air at least that was the law at the time of these contracts  value of funeral and burial x based grave markers another funeral and burial merchandise you know the burial insurance the proceeds of which can be used only used to pay funeral and burial expenses of the insured to the same extent that such items are excluded from consideration in the federal supplemental income security program we have to then turn to that program and what you said to the extent they can only  right but in your case if the back so i care of expenses they can be passed on and even if there's a burial contract under the under the law which under the same act that they used to say there has to be a burial contract which is the funeral and burial act they're under when there is a contract with a funeral provider this is two twenty five slash four friend c dash five if after the death of the beneficiary no funeral merchandise or services are provided with funeral is conducted by another provider the seller may keep no more than ten percent of the payments made in the pre made contract or three hundred dollars whichever sum is less then most importantly the remainder of the trust funds or insurance or a nerdy proceeds shall be forwarded to the legal heirs of the deceased beneficiary so even th get is a loser because even if there's a burial contract by statute that says if there's anything left over under an irrevocable insurance funded policy trust it has to go to the  is rather short condition i don't know if it's subsequent or procedure but we got some conditioning here that makes this not a total contra flow i don't think so i mean we can become  with forty five dates seems to me this changes the entire nature of the claim that this is a crack trip the beneficiaries could say you know we're going to choose you is the future all home but you really have to trust the person some sort of conspiracy theory though i i why is this language that was my first question why is this language here what is the purpose of it as a proviso wires or just say the trust requires trust we want to get the money out of our hands and have it over i mean i can think of no other reason than the money but the medicate holocene manual refers to four different types of funeral arrangements that are patrick the funeral home i could buy a trust account or a prepaid burial contract with the funeral home i did buy a life insurance policy which is what you have a life insurance policy start with federal supplemental security program policy manual the palms o eleven thirty forty four to five a one which says a life insurance funded burial contractor involves an individual person or just sing a life insurance policy on burial contract so this is just the purpose of which is to set aside for purposes of final disposition we both go to the the related home which specifically address where there is an irrevocable burial contract so these provisions do not apply to a very low trust where and this is first option is an individual a radical a contract with the provider if you know goods and services for a funeral an there is an estimate included an inch of these contracts from a specific room saying this is an estimate of what it's going to cost but there is no contractual provision that the that the funeral can only be provided for that  practical the world what to me is a practical question what is the purpose of doing this the way that you have done it as opposed to or the way it's been done as opposed to provides that if you did or into a pro contract with a specific you know home here and then you wanted to transfer that you're allowed to scratch to do that but you got to leave ten percent or three hundred dollars with your original provider supportability is one issue another one is there are people who just don't want to go and deal with a funeral home for psychological reasons or whatever they want to make the arrangements but they don't want to go down and pick on specific things that would be another and i think we've been integrated you know some others but you know i guess my question comes down to is why on earth is the department carrying a brief for funerals that's really what's going on here is they're saying you've got to go to a funeral home to contract for these the final disposition of your revocable basis the specific purpose of which is and in this case we've got an example mrs jane in the record says that's exactly what happened it was there in the family even pointed up another seventy bucks or something that just finished out but the whole purpose of the trust was actually fulfilled mr greer also died during the pendency but it was not in the record because he died after the fact but you know the plan works perfectly so you know what is the reason why we're saying you know we have to favor specific funeral homes to go there and if you want to end up going there we cited the recent case of st joseph's abbey there are lots of constitutional issues why that shouldn't be the case there's it's a restraint on  i agree with my opponent we have three distinct issues in this case even though they're spread over the consolidated appeals with regard to this issue take up most of the morning earlier that that involves all three of of our liv allow them to set aside twelve thousand dollars if they haven't why he says because when our when our person receives the application process and so they have to be able to assess whether there's been a fair market value and this is a bit of an important point they can see their application they've made a twelve thousand dollar transfer and so at that point our person processing says this is a transfer you have the burden of proof to show that there's been a fair market value transfer that  fair market value transferred here to the applicant shop twelve thousand dollars was a value and therefore it's in the end of there won't be a penalty for it but what we have here is something that looks like a contract per country but is it one and in fact if it were hurdle contract position doesn't say that i think it's there though to give up the greatest amount of flexibility to the family after the person dies including the option of not using that money for the person who that the issue is whether the agency reasonably the size this was not something that guaranteed your money and the fact there isn't a contract with the fuel provider shows that it's not that's evidence that d illinois law didn't speak to partially true and so the the hearing officers here decided that we would not recognize this person returns and one of the interesting things about the person returns in this case is they seem to have been designed entirely to bring the application of the maximum possible benefit the returns don't seem like they will return on the ordinary course but done with a view towards the application and not case it's my argument that the court should not require an apartment to recognize partial so there is a situation in our wrecks talk about this where someone may make a sale of an asset for lessons and that case the transaction would be recognized as a partial return because the reg says  portion that was for value you know the for the track transaction will be wrecked but that's not what happened here we have money being passed back and forth the money that was in back to the state or the apple was not in any connected to anything in the real world like a sale of the house it was simply done to maximize on the point of unemployment medicaid benefits in this case and so it's my argument that in that particular situation even though there's the after january first twenty twelve illinois implemented new regulations which apply a whole different scheme to all of the decision making tree that has to happen in your part that the the state no longer recognizes  partial and there is not a month by month calculation of of benefit it's all one big period so you'd be getting back and forth like happened here would not bring any benefit to apple we have to leave my second two issues to the briefs i think we've adequately addressed all of those in the briefs with respect to the argument that this has to be a very a contract we've got to look at the only  variable fines act and the act itself states what its purpose is it is a regulatory act for the furnishing or delivery of personal property merchandise or services a connection of the final disposition of dead bodies and regulating or use  the and we look further on the act the act distinguishes it doesn't talk in terms of their prepaid burial contracts if talks about pre made contracts which we suggest and we've tried to illustrate this visually in our brief remede contracts are a subset of the whole very a contract notion the act defies it defines a pretty neat contract means any agreement or contract or any series or combination of agreements or contracts with a funded by trust or life insurance policies which have for a purpose the furnishing or performance of funeral services or furnishing or delivery of any personal property merchandise for services of any nature in connection of the final disposition of a dead body we're not talking about regulating funeral directors here they're also defined as providers meaning persons are obligated for furnishing they're performing funeral services or the furniture delivery of any personal property merchandise or service of any natural of  nature in the connection with the final disposition of the body again that act is for the regulation of that of you know homes cemeteries and the majority not where a person an applicant for medical assistance is entitled to a contract for the final disposition of the remains in a narrow position and we can speculate about the forty five day period and its purpose all along but i think if we had the funeral contract or the actual current very contract at the funeral home we're going to find the same kind of a provision in that contract that's obviously not before this court that you know we've had after forty five days or whatever period of time they come has to come to an end so i don't see that as a as an important issue and it certainly shouldn't scuttle the right of the medicaid applicant in under these circumstances to make a final provision for the disposition of remains under this sort of provision and to force them to go to a funeral home and to contract specifically for specific goods and medicine something called the state policy manual but that's a federal document ok but the medicaid house made it and are you saying i want to go this question the answer to this question are you saying the medicaid policy manual is wrong itself or the administrative hearing officer in fines of funeral act in order to say that because you didn't contract the funeral director you didn't get fair market value i'm talking about now some are clear i'm talking about the medicaid policy manual p under three o five i also yes five slash three dash one point two which says that the state the a person in need of medical assistance is entitled to follow the federal supplemental security or the doctors were challenging the application of the rules that apply the rules permit