Opinion ID: 480354
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Governing Legal Precepts

Text: 20 The PRRB and the district court, in their respective analyses of these reimbursement issues, disagreed fundamentally on the proper application of the relevant Medicare regulations. In assessing the relatedness of the Monsour family and the Foundation, the Board looked to the corporate long-term planning period. 16 Monsour Medical Center v. Blue Cross & Blue Shield Ass'n/Blue Cross of W. Pa., PRRB Hearing Dec. No. 80-24, at 20 (June 14, 1984); Appellant's App. at A64. The district court, by contrast, believed that focusing on that earlier time period beg[ged] the issue, i.e., whether the Monsours continued to control the Center after the sale. Monsour Medical Center v. Heckler, No. 84-1938, at 11 (W.D.Pa. Dec. 30, 1985); Appellant's App. at A79. Although the regulations--like the analyses of this issue by both the PRRB and the district court--lack ideal clarity, we will accept the PRRB's interpretation of them. 21 The regulation governing depreciation, although it does not speak of control or relatedness, 17 requires a purchaser of a care providing facility to demonstrate that the sale was bona fide. 42 C.F.R. Sec. 405.415(g)(3) (1985). We interpret this regulation as addressing the bona fides of a sale at the time of that sale. The regulation governing interest costs paid to a lender ... [by] the borrowing organization does speak of control, personal relationship and related[ness]. 42 C.F.R. Sec. 405.419(b)(3)(ii) (1985). We interpret this regulation as addressing, though less clearly than the previous regulation, the control, personal relationship and related[ness] of parties to a loan at the time of their borrowing and lending. So far as we can ascertain from its hearing decision, these were and are the PRRB's interpretations of its governing regulations. 18 As a reviewing court constrained by the A.P.A., [w]e must ... accept the agency's view so long as the 'interpretation[§ are] within the range of reasonable meanings that the words of the regulation[s] admit.'  19 Butler County Memorial Hospital, 780 F.2d at 355-56 (quoting Psychiatric Institute of Washington, D.C., Inc. v. Schweiker, 669 F.2d 812, 813-14 (D.C.Cir.1981) (per curiam)). 20 Based on our own reading of the regulatory language, we conclude that the Secretary's apparent interpretations are plainly reasonable. In these circumstances, where there is no evidence that accepting the Secretary's interpretive expertise will actually shield an irrational decision-making process, Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. v. EPA, 790 F.2d 289, 298 (3d Cir.1986), or work[ ] an unduly harsh result in the name of an otherwise valid and laudable regulation, Hart v. Bowen, 799 F.2d 567, 570 (9th Cir.1986), there is no basis for second-guessing the agency. The district court therefore erred as a matter of law in replacing these interpretations, which are completely within the range of reasonable meanings [that] may logically ... be drawn from the words of the regulation[s], Garner v. United States Office of Personnel Management, 633 F.Supp. 995, 999 (E.D.Pa.1986), with its own views.