VA Targeting Easy Bay, Central Valley Sites for New Clinics
Eric Louie
Contra Costa Times
July 24th, 2009
Potential sites have been selected for two new veterans clinics in the East Bay and Central Valley, the federal Department of Veterans Affairs announced. The clinics, which would open around 2015, are being targeted for the Stockton/French Camp area of San Joaquin County and the Hayward/Fremont area of Alameda County, VA officials said. A selection board will make specific site recommendations this fall after reviewing available properties, officials said. The Stockton/French Camp location would include a multi-specialty outpatient clinic and a 120-bed nursing home. The Fremont/Hayward location would offer similar features but no nursing home.
The site announcements are the latest step in a process that started five years ago when the VA decided to relocate its Livermore-based programs.
The new locations were selected based on analysis of where most veterans live in Northern California, access to transportation, potential for hospital partnerships, cost of land and availability of qualified medical staff, officials said. The next step in the process is acquiring land, VA officials said. Money for those purchases will be included in the 2010 federal budget, they said. HDR, of Sunnyvale, will provide architectural and engineering services for both sites, officials said, with work scheduled to start in the fall. The announcement comes two months after the VA announced that the Central Valley clinic would be in San Joaquin County.
U.S. Rep. Jerry McNerney, D-Pleasanton, and others have pushed for a nursing home and clinic to be built at the existing French Camp facility near San Joaquin General Hospital. The VA is already planning to increase services in the Fremont/Hayward area this year. A temporary clinic is scheduled to open in central Fremont around December, said Kerri Childress, a spokeswoman for the VA Palo Alto Heath Care System. At about the same time, there will be expansions of interim sites in French Camp and Modesto, she said.
Meanwhile, McNerney spokeswoman Sarah Hersh said the congressman will continue to advocate for keeping veterans services in Livermore. The VA will evaluate the best use of the Livermore site once the new facilities are built. One possibility, Childress said, would be leasing the Livermore site to a private nursing home at a discounted rate in exchange for beds being reserved for veterans.
http://www.mercurynews.com/alamedacounty/ci_12901312?nclick_check=1
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