By: Derek Hawkins//September 1, 2015//
Civil
7th Circuit Court of Appeals
Officials: BAUER, FLAUM, and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judge
Bankruptcy – Collection
No.14-2420; 14-2546 Saint Catherine Hospital of Indiana, LLC v. Indiana Family and Social Services
Hospital Assessment Fees held to be a pre-petition claim subject to an automatic stay.
“That St. Catherine’s continued operation as an eligible hospital on July 1, 2012 may have been required in order for the 2013 HAF to be assessed does not change our analysis. This fact would simply make the claim “contingent” upon the hospital’s continued eligibility on July 1, 2012. A “contingent” claim is one conditioned upon some future event that is uncertain. See In re Rosteck, 899 F.2d at 697 (quoting Grady, 839 F.2d at 200) (defining contingent as “[p]ossible but not assured; doubtful or uncertain; conditioned upon some future event which is itself uncertain or questionable …. impl[ying] that no present interest exists, and that whether such interest or right will ever exist depends upon a future uncertain event”). And as noted above, the Code’s definition of “claim” explicitly includes any “right to payment, whether or not such right is … contingent” upon some future event, which may or may not happen after the filing of a bankruptcy petition. See 11 U.S.C. § 101(5)(A). Thus, assuming FSSA’s reading of Provider Bulletin BT201217 is accurate, it would simply mean that had St. Catherine ceased to be an eligible hospital prior to the beginning of the fiscal year 2013, a contingency for its 2013 HAF liability would not have been met. It would not mean that the underlying claim did not already exist”
Reversed and Remanded