Church Group Wipes Out $415K In Debt In Burlington County

BURLINGTON COUNTY, NJ — Ninety-nine households in Burlington County will receive a total of $415,000 from 92 people in eight United Church of Christ (UCC) congregations, as well as other church agencies, to abolish medical debt, the group announced Tuesday morning.

Together, the UCC has abolished more than $9 million in medical debt in four states, including more than $8 million in New Jersey. Their latest debt-relief campaign raised $65,522.21, according to the UCC.

The UCC said it doesn’t know specifically who benefitted from the debt buy because it was made anonymously. Through RIP Medical Debt, a yellow envelope bearing a UCC logo is on the way to each benefiting family, with a letter naming contributing congregations and organizations. It reads: “You may never enter the doors of one of our churches, but we are the United Church of Christ and we love you. … Most importantly, you are beloved by God and your debt has been forgiven.”

Those who qualified were residents who:

• earned less than two times the federal poverty level;
• are experiencing financial hardship, with out-of-pocket expenses that are 5 percent or more of their annual income; or
• are facing insolvency, with more debt than what they make.

The money was raised at the height of the coronavirus pandemic, according to Rev. Timothy Tutt, senior minister of the Westmoreland Congregational UCC in Bethesda, Maryland.

“One of the things that pandemic showed us is that medical care in this country is precarious and life is fragile,” Tutt said. “I’m very proud that this network of UCC churches came to together during the pandemic to help alleviate medical debt for our neighbors. At a time when people were isolated, trapped and afraid, we reached out with communal dollars to care for the vulnerable and at-risk.”

The purchase wiped out $9,031,581.83 in medical debt for 7,817 households. The average amount forgiven per household was $1,155.38. In New Jersey, $8,032,303 in debt was abolished for 6,965 households in 14 counties. The highest amounts were in:

• Passaic County (over $3.41 million, 4,251 households);
• Ocean County (over $2.08 million, 1,212 households);
• Essex County (over $1.6 million, 1,087 households);
• Burlington County (over $415,000, 99 households); and
• Camden County (nearly $215,000, 137 households).

“Our church was excited to participate,” said the Rev. Ellen Jennings, pastor of the Cleveland Park congregation. “This is such a huge justice issue for so many people, most especially those with lower incomes, who are not eligible for Medicaid or Medicare. One of our members, who has mental health issues, has faced major difficulties with medical debt specifically due to the inequities involved with mental health care coverage.”

Contributions to the campaign came from Christ Congregational UCC, Silver Spring, Md.; Cleveland Park Congregational UCC, Washington; First Congregational UCC, Washington; Hope UCC, Alexandria, Va.; Little River UCC, Annandale, Va.; Rock Spring Congregational UCC, Arlington, Va.; UCC of Seneca Valley, Gaithersburg, Md.; Westmoreland Congregational UCC, Bethesda, Md.; the Justice and Witness Committee of the Potomac Association in the UCC’s Central Atlantic Conference; and a Cleveland-based national UCC ministry, Justice and Local Church Ministries.

The church’s medical debt project began with a 2019 buy in Chicago, where donations abolished $5.3 million in debt for 5,888 families on the city’s South Side.

In January 2020, the effort moved to St. Louis, where $12.9 million in medical debt was eliminated for 11,108 households in that city and St. Louis County.

In June 2020, nine California congregations in the East Bay Area wiped out $7.4 million in medical debt for 3,539 households across the state.

In October 2020, a collaborative effort by 122 United Church of Christ congregations, four Associations, and more than 100 households in the Southern New England Conference abolished $26.2 million in medical debt in two separate buys. Recipients were families in seven states in and around New England and first responders across the country who benefit from RIP’s Helping COVID Heroes Fund.

In November 2020, gifts from 20 United Church of Christ congregations in the denomination’s Kansas-Oklahoma Conference, plus several individuals and church bodies, abolished $5.2 million in medical debt in those two states. More than 3,200 households benefited from that buy.

To date, $66 million in medical debt has been abolished by the UCC.

The campaign continues through at least the summer of 2021, reaching low-income Americans in each of the UCC’s geographic regions. A sixth and seventh buy is in progress in the UCC Southwest Conference and the UCC’s Southern Region.