After years of litigation stirred by a front-page article in the Wall Street Journal, Provena Hospitals in Urbana, Illinois, has finally lost its real estate tax exemption for the year 2002. The state Supreme Court has affirmed a decision by an appellate court that the hospital had not shown that it was either a charitable institution or a religious organization entitled to exemption. ( See Nonprofit Issues ®, 8/16/08 .) The Journal’s article described the collection practices of several hospitals in the area and questioned whether the hospitals provided charity care sufficient to entitle them to exemption. The local assessors took up the claim and denied real estate tax exemption. The...