ALBERT LEA —Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson said Monday that no anti-trust  laws were broken when Mayo Clinic Health System decided to move inpatient services to Austin from Albert Lea, according to a report in the Rochester Post-Bulletin.

Swanson said her staff spent weeks looking into possible violations but said there was no evidence laws were broken.

The article continued to say that Swanson will review whether the plan violates state laws governing non-profits, which includes studying how the decision was made to move the services anyhow money donated to the Albert Lea campus has been used, said the Post-Bulletin.

The comments came after Swanson and officials from other state agencies met with Albert Lea
officials on Monday to discuss the impact of the move.

The Albert Lea Tribune reported that Swanson’s visit came five days after Assistant Attorney General Benjamin Velzen, manager of the charities division, wrote a letter to Mayo Clinic asking for answers to 23 questions dealing with the decision-making and finance concerns.

The letter asked Mayo The letter asked Mayo to provide a detailed description of services that would no longer be offered at each campus and meeting minutes when plans for the transition were discussed.

The Attorney General’s Office also asked all current and former board members, directors and officers of the health system board since the beginning of 2016 about whether they “reviewed, deliberated or voted” on the transition. It asked for a copy of the facilities analysis completed prior to the decision being made.

The office asked Mayo to identify donations received by the Naeve Health Care Foundation and The Hormel Foundation as well as documents showing the health system’s financial statements for the past three years and evidence showing it has had difficulty attracting physicians to work at the hospital, among other questions.

Swanson’s office requested Mayo’s response by Aug. 30.

At Monday’s meeting in Albert Lea, Swanson said: Bylaws give the hospital substantial authority, said Swanson, who stated the hospital has to have a supermajority vote of at least 10 of 13 members on its board of directors to discontinue services within its corporation, but Mayo Clinic Health System in Albert Lea and Austin is one corporate entity with two hospitals. The hospital can remove board members who do not vote the way it wants them to.

Swanson said she wants to see Mayo engage in community discussions in the future, and she thinks the transition was sprung on the community without advanced notice, meetings or dialogue.

In a statement issued Monday afternoon, Mayo Clinic Health System stated: “We appreciate the interest from elected officials in the challenges we’re facing in rural health. These challenges are not unique to southeast Minnesota or to Mayo Clinic Health System, and the changes we’re making are intended to keep both the Albert Lea and Austin campuses viable and available to current and future generations of patients.”

A community stakeholder panel with representatives from Mayo Clinic Health System, the city of Albert Lea and Freeborn County has been formed.

“We are also meeting with local business groups and service clubs to listen and address concerns,” the health system said.

The stakeholder panel will meet on an ongoing basis over several months to discuss the move, address concerns from the community and oversee completion of an economic impact analysis, which is expected to be completed in the near future, according to a news release.

After the meeting, Department of Health Commissioner Ed Ehlinger told the Albert Lea Tribune he appreciated the visit.

“It was nice to come down here to talk with city and county officials to see what their concerns were — what they’ve done so far to address the issue of possibly losing some of the services at the local hospital,” he said. “To get their take on it and really ask some questions of local leaders and see what the attorney general was thinking about in her way of addressing this.”