Court Opinion

ID: 9648418
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:19:54.160724+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:00.618147
License: Public Domain

NIGRO, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s conclusion that Washington & Jefferson College is a purely public charity. In *188mechanically applying the HUP test, the majority has so broadly construed its requirements that any private college or university can satisfy the test and obtain tax-exempt status.
In establishing the test for a purely public charity, the Court looked to its earlier decisions defining charitable organizations. The Court stated:
The word ‘charitable’, in a legal sense, includes every gift for a general public use, to be applied, consistent with existing laws, for the benefit of an indefinite number of persons, and designed to benefit them for an educational, religious, oral, physical or social standpoint. In its broadest meaning it is understood “to refer to something done or given for the benefit of our fellows or the public.” (citation omitted).
Hospital Utilization Project v. Commonwealth, 507 Pa. 1, 18, 487 A.2d 1306, 1315 (1985). Washington & Jefferson College educates those who can afford to pay the annual $20,000 a year cost of tuition, room and board. As a practical matter, the College’s doors are closed to many. The College gives the majority of its students financial assistance but yet those who still cannot afford to attend may not enroll.
Private colleges such as Washington & Jefferson College have been categorically exempted from taxation essentially because—like hospitals—they are non-profit organizations. The fact that an entity reinvests its revenue within, however, does not make it a charitable organization serving the general public. I doubt that the general public views private universities and hospitals as charitable organizations.
Providing private higher education and health care is certainly socially beneficial and valuable to society. I appreciate the common good that these institutions advance. However, many private entities are valuable to society. It does not logically follow that they are charitable. Common sense dictates that if these institutions can so easily satisfy the HUP test for tax exemption, the test is being applied too broadly or is crying out for revision.
*189The HUP test should be applied to reinforce the traditional characteristics of charities rather than to expand their scope to the point that the term ‘charity’ is meaningless. As a result of finding that Washington & Jefferson College is a purely public charity, it will receive municipal services for the 87 properties at issue in this suit at no cost. As colleges and hospitals expand throughout the municipalities of this Commonwealth, it is the individual taxpayer who is left shouldering the burden of these institutions’ tax-free status. For these reasons, I dissent.