UAB to build new Cooper Green clinic, replacing old hospital by 2025
Construction will soon be underway for the new Cooper Green Clinic on 6th Ave S. in Birmingham.
Jefferson County and the University of Alabama at Birmingham are moving forward with plans to build a new $55 to $65 million facility for Cooper Green Mercy Health Services, with details for demolition and construction announced at a press conference Tuesday.
“The new clinic will focus on patient care and the quality of that care, providing patients excellent access and convenience and the adoption of new technologies,” said David Randall, chief strategy officer for the UAB Health System.
The new clinic will offer both current services and new ones. Under UAB, Cooper Green has added behavioral health and pain management services, as well as nutrition medicine.
“Our hope is that the new Cooper Green Clinic, the services that we’re providing both in the clinic and outside, will be a standard of care — a model, if you will — for best practice nationally and will strengthen the fact that Birmingham is a national epicenter for health care services,” Randall said.
Miranda Fulmore,WBHM
The current Cooper Green Mercy Health Service building.
Crews began to prepare the building for demolition in August at the site on 6th Avenue South. Randall said construction will have two phases. First, a full demolition later this year or January 2022, which will be completed by the spring of 2022. Construction of the new 150,000-square-foot building will take about two and a half to three years.
“Approximately 2025, we would hope to have a ribbon-cutting at that point,” Randall said.
The project is expected to cost between $55 and $65 million. Randall said county-backed bonds will be issued to pay for the construction, as well as public funding for indigent care and revenue from the hospital.
The Alabama Legislature established funding for indigent care in 1965, using revenues collected from county sales and liquor taxes. Cooper Green Mercy Health Services first opened in 1972 as Mercy Hospital, providing healthcare services to all Jefferson County residents, with fees based on family size and income.
Nearly ten years ago, Jefferson County filed for bankruptcy and transitioned the hospital to an outpatient clinic called Cooper Green Mercy Health Services, working with existing hospitals for inpatient needs. The hospital’s future was uncertain back then. But Deputy County Manager Walter Jackson said the announcement of a new facility is a “moment of pride for Jefferson County.”
“We have a great university partnering with the county government and a county government that is using our taxpayer dollars to the fullest extent in terms of being accountable and fiscally responsible,” Jackson said.
Editor’s Note: UAB holds WBHM’s broadcast license. But the news and business departments operate separately.
She owed $7K due to a water leak. Her utility saw the signs but didn’t tell her
Birmingham Water Works flagged Claire Ahalt’s account for unusually high water use, but she did not find out until asking a utility worker weeks later.
City OK’s $5 million to help keep Birmingham-Southern College open
BSC President Daniel Coleman said in a statement that next he’ll ask Jefferson County to meet the city’s commitment, focus on private donors and reengage with state leaders to work on getting more funding.
A year after the Moody landfill fire: “We need just as much help now”
Around Thanksgiving a year ago a landfill near Moody caught fire blanketing the surrounding area with smoke. The fire burned for months before the Environmental Protection Agency covered the landfill with dirt to extinguish the flames, but there have been flare ups since. To understand what things are like now, we heard from one nearby resident.
Why trees are an environmental and health Swiss army knife
Cool Green Trees plants trees in under-resourced communities in the Birmingham area to help mitigate climate change and advance environmental justice initiatives.
A pro jiu-jitsu league is bringing grapplers from across the globe to a small city in Alabama
For acclaimed grappler Brandon Mccaghren, Decatur, Alabama, was the perfect place to grow the Professional Grappling Federation from idea to reality.
The flu is soaring in the South and rising elsewhere
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted new flu data on Friday, showing very high activity last week in Louisiana, and high activity in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, New Mexico and South Carolina.
