Checklist: Examine the Van Nuys hospice registrations, report what the assemblywoman found on site, note state audit findings and past overbilling, detail the lawmakers’ letter and quoted criticisms, and contrast the governor’s claimed enforcement with the persistent registration issue.

Newsom’s Hospice Fraud ‘Crackdown’ Collapses: 197 Agencies Registered to One Address

California officials say they tightened oversight of hospice providers under Governor Gavin Newsom, but a recent on-the-ground check found 197 hospice agencies listed at a single Van Nuys address. Republican Assemblywoman Alexandra Macedo traced dozens of entries in state licensing records to 14545 Friar St. and then visited the location herself to see what was really there. Her findings raise questions about whether licensing checks are meaningful when paper records diverge so sharply from physical reality.

Macedo reported that the building at that address looked rundown and lacked features you’d expect for a functioning patient-facing medical facility. Phone numbers tied to many of the listed agencies either did not work, went unanswered, or ended abruptly when callers were answered. Observing the property, she said she did not see activity consistent with multiple hospices serving fragile patients and their families.

Those on-site observations echo broader red flags flagged in past state reviews and independent reporting. Auditors previously concluded that Los Angeles hospice providers overbilled Medicare by roughly $105 million between 2017 and 2019 and identified overlapping addresses, administrators, and medical directors in state records. One report noted that “More than 700 of the roughly 1,800 hospice agencies in Los Angeles County had two or more indicators commonly associated with fraud… raising concerns about whether some providers are exploiting the system.”

Macedo’s findings put a single, specific address on that larger pattern of problematic records. The building carried a “Medical Plaza” sign, but the assemblywoman said she saw “No patient, by the way,” and added, “I did not see a single person coming in or out of the building, or doctors or nurses or anything like that.” Those are not just cosmetic problems; they are the sort of practical mismatches regulators should catch during licensing and inspections.

Republican lawmakers, including Macedo, sent a letter urging Governor Newsom to implement emergency regulations recommended by a 2022 state audit designed to stop licensing abuses. The lawmakers pointed to roughly 2,100 complaints filed between January 2015 and August 2021, including nearly 350 alleging fraud or abuse, and cited audit findings that suggested organized networks in Los Angeles County may have been defrauding Medicare and Medi-Cal hospice programs. Their letter bluntly accused the administration of failing to act on those prior recommendations.

That letter contained a direct charge about the state’s response: “It has been four years since the audit report; your Administration has failed to protect families in the most difficult moment of their lives,” the lawmakers wrote. “Most people have never had to choose hospice before; they do not know what questions to ask, what warning signs to look for, or who to trust. That is why state oversight matters, and right now the system is broken.” Those words are aimed at illustrating how policy promises in Sacramento can look very different on the street level.

The governor’s office points to prior enforcement moves, including a moratorium on issuing new hospice licenses and a multi-agency task force focused on fraud. Those steps sound substantial on paper, but they leave unanswered how nearly 200 agencies wound up tied to a single Van Nuys address in the first place and why they remained active long enough to be cataloged. A moratorium does nothing about already approved licenses that appear to be part of a coordinated pattern of suspicious listings.

Regulatory reforms recommended in audits were supposed to address exactly this sort of problem: overlapping addresses, repeat administrators, and billing practices that scream for closer scrutiny. Yet the persistence of these registration anomalies suggests the reforms were too slow, too narrow, or never fully enforced. For families facing end-of-life decisions, the consequences are serious because bad actors can siphon taxpayer dollars and undermine care quality without robust, consistent oversight.

Public accountability depends on follow-through. State records that allow hundreds of hospice names to point back to one mailbox do not inspire confidence in existing safeguards. Unless the emergency regulations and audit recommendations are adopted and enforced with teeth, paper fixes will keep looking like victories while the underlying problems stay firmly in place.