We’ll never know
Whether Erlanger Health System is diverting funds from health care to pay for naming rights on the new Chattanooga Lookouts stadium — officials there say they are not — its move from a public to a private entity in 2023 means the public will never know a lot of things about the operations of the city’s oldest and largest hospital.
It is the type of thing we feared when the beginning of the transition was announced in March 2022. At the time, we said “we could picture a hospital that, absent public scrutiny of public board meetings, might make decisions it would not have made if watchdogs weren’t present.”
Erlanger and the Lookouts have refused to say how much the health system is paying for the naming rights.
“Nobody knows the number except us two private entities,” Erlanger CEO Jim Coleman said. “The number was in the budget. We did our homework.”