Ground is set to be broken before the end of the year on a major $25 million expansion for Mountain View Hospital in Madras. HDR, an employee-owned architecture, engineering and consulting firm with offices in Bend is providing the design/build services for the hospital project.
Interim Chief Executive Officer Joe Smith said the project was now fully designed and ready to start construction some time in October or early November, once Housing and Urban Development (HUD) program financing offering preferential interest rates – critical in enabling smaller hospitals execute such rural projects – was in place.
The project will involve a 60,000 square foot addition as well as some remodeling and the removal of approximately 25,000 sf of original older buildings, eventually boosting the facility’s total size to around 110,000 sf and allowing provision of health care in a more cost effective way and vastly improving functonal flow.
Smith said: “The building that most of the care services are housed in was constructed in the 1960’s. Its useful life is depleted and it would not meet current appropriate standards.
“The flow in the original building also does not work with the way healthcare delivered today and has a lot of inherent inefficiency and limiting factors.
“The goal of the board and management is to take the opportunity to construct a state of the art health care facility that will serve Jefferson County for the next 25-30 years. This is effectively a replacement project as a simple remodel just wouldn’t cut it.”
Smith added that it was important for the community to have a quality full service primary care hospital, which acted as an important economic engine. He said: “Not only do we offer solid positions to around 260 employees, the hospital also aids in recruiting new companies to the area as checking what healthcare facilities in place is part of that analysis.
“The revamped facility gives us a good platform to recruit physicians who want to practice in a quality service environment. We are excited to partner with the COCC Madras campus to look at vocational educational and training programs in the
healthcare field. There really seems to be a connection between all the newer projects going on in Madras and it is the quality of life issues being addressed that attracts people to the area.”
