TERRE HAUTE, IN | by Howard Greninger | March 6, 2019
Original article can be found at: https://www.newsandtribune.com
The Wabash Valley Health Center is seeking to undertake a more than $3.4 million expansion of its facility at 1412 Locust St. on Terre Haute’s north side.
Lou Britton, attorney for the center, Wednesday addressed the Terre Haute Board of Zoning Appeals saying the center plans to add a 3,200-square-foot addition to the west side of the center adding at least five medical exam rooms. The center currently has 10.
The addition will also add a denture lab and expanded waiting room capacity. Additionally, a parking lot will be expanded on the north side.
The clinic was established in 1997 as St. Ann Medical Clinic. A dental clinic was opened in 2005. The clinic was incorporated as the Wabash Valley Health Center in 2011. In 2013, it became a federally qualified health center, accepting Medicare, Medicaid and most types of insurance.
The center employs 35 people, Britton told the board, and has made $465,000 in improvements over the past 5 years.
Those investments include adding five medical exam rooms in 2014; a 2016 renovation of the existing dental clinic; in 2017, a relocation and renovation of behavioral health services and expansion of dental clinic. The center now has six dental clinic rooms.
A new location was considered for the center. However, the health clinic’s board of directors concluded “the most benefit would be to expand the current facility,” Britton told the Board of Zoning Appeals, which approved a 41-foot reduction requirement for the project’s western border. The reduction allows the project to be closer to the nearest residential property line.
The project also went before the Vigo County Area Plan Commission on Wednesday. It next goes before the Terre Haute City Council today, which will also consider a petition to vacate a portion of the alley behind the clinic for a new parking lot.
The clinic is purchasing property from the nearby Bethany House, owned by the Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis, for the expansion project, Britton told the Zoning Appeals Board.
Britton said the archdiocese owns property on both sides of the alley and vacating a portion of the alley would allow a new parking area as well as patient access to the facility’s west side, which will become the main entrance.
Britton said the project is proposing to “dedicate a new, wider alley, running through the parking lot. That will allow the archdiocese to develop property on both sides of the property for whatever they desire,” Britton told the Zoning Appeals Board.
The new alley would exit onto First Avenue, instead of out onto 14th Street, Britton said.
Charles Welker, CEO of health center, Wednesday said design plans have yet to be finalized, but said the project is slated to start this year.
“We are essentially at capacity,” Welker said. “We know there is still a great deal of unmet need.”
Reporter Howard Greninger can be reached 812-231-4204 or howard.greninger@tribstar.com. Follow onTwitter@TribStarHoward.
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