Snoqualmie Valley Hospital has its eyes on a new site
October 30, 2008
By Ed Farrell
A new plan to relocate Snoqualmie Valley Hospital, this time to a smaller site within the Snoqualmie city limits, was unveiled Monday by hospital officials.
Hospital director Rodger McCollum told the Snoqualmie City Council “we’re in full design mode now” to locate the new 67,000-square-foot, 28-bed medical center just inside the city limits at State Route 18 and SE 99th Street.
The new site is very close — virtually across the street — to the SR18/I-90 location originally desired by the hospital, but which was rejected when the King County Council declined to expand the city’s Urban Growth Area, a move necessary to allow the annexation to the city required by the hospital.
McCollum’s brief presentation showed a scaled-back plan on 7 acres of land, rather than the hospital’s earlier proposal for a 72-acre parcel that would have potentially included a campus of Bellevue Community College, a hotel and a senior care facility.
Access to the parcel, which consists of the western portion of a 14-acre parcel, would be off SE 99th Street, McCollum said.
McCollum’s plan did include, however, a tentative picture of additional development on the remaining 7-acres — abutting Snoqualmie Parkway — which he said would be a good site for, among other uses, a hotel or medical offices.
The tentative deal, McCollum said, was being negotiated between King County Hospital District No. 4, Quadrant Homes, Murray Franklyn and Opus.
Council response to the plan was mixed; Mayor Matt Larson acknowledged the parcel in question, although currently zoned for residential development, was the last large parcel available to the city in the Snoqualmie Ridge II agreement, and had been “reserved” for potential commercial business development.
City Attorney Pat Anderson told the council that the plan was presently “not an acceptable use,” for the parcel in question, and would “require some changes” in land use plans to allow such a project to move forward.
McCollum said the new location was one of only two remaining that would keep the hospital in Snoqualmie; a potential relocation to the Snoqualmie Ridge Business Park would still be possible, he said, but city officials have already stated they do not favor giving up potential commercial acreage in the park to the hospital.
When Larson called for a consensus on the council’s feelings on the proposal, several council members declined.
“There’s a time and a place for us to make a consensus,” said Councilman Jeff MacNichols, “but I’m certainly not prepared to make a decision on this tonight.”
“I heard no mention of an assisted-living center with this,” said Councilman Charles Peterson, “and it gives me less interest in supporting this.”
Despite telling the council the hospital was “in full design mode,” McCollum later stated the entire proposal “is all theoretical.”
State Rep. Jay Rodne, who serves as the hospital district’s counsel, told the board the presentation was “only informational. It’s a conceptual plan that could occur.”
McCollum declined to disclose how much it would cost the hospital to purchase the land, referring to the price only as “a lot less” than the $24 million the district had budgeted for land acquisition under its original proposal.
McCollum also said the property, by virtue of its being part of the original development package between the city and Quadrant, would be exempt from entering into a “latecomer’s agreement” that would otherwise require the hospital to pay its fair share of pre-existing infrastructure costs.
It was the district’s inability to shoulder those infrastructure costs, according to both city and hospital officials, that was instrumental in abandoning the original site plan, even before the county rejected the request to expand the city’s sphere of influence.
The need for the district to move forward with relocation is precipitated by the fact that it has already sold the current hospital, a 25,000-square-foot facility, along with 50 acres of land, to the Snoqualmie Tribe for $30 million.
Reach reporter Ed Farrell at efarrell@snovalleystar.com or 392-6434.
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Its about time we get a state of the art medical facility in the valley again! The hospital that we have now is just not up to technological standards. I’m sure that many in the valley will flock to this hospital instead of having to drive all the way into Bellevue for services, or Issaquah if Swedish moves in.