St. David's HealthCare is amping up its South Austin game after the Planning Commission gave the go-ahead for a hefty expansion of its medical office building. The rezoning nod, which came on February 13, paves the way for the healthcare provider to transform the 1980s structure at 4007 James Casey St. from a modest 58,205 square feet to a whopping additional 136,000 square feet of state-of-the-art medical space. With a unanimous vote, the Commission members are all in on the project, eyeing it as a critical response to the escalating healthcare needs of the local community.
Despite friction with neighborhood groups who wanted to hit the brakes on the expansion, the plans for St. David's are charging forward, an expansion that's part of a larger, ambitious $1 billion improvement spree across Austin announced last year St. David's owns the lion's share of this property, 51 percent to be exact, planning not just to add some office space but to basically transform the local medical landscape, according to a previous report by the Austin Monitor.
Commissioner Felicity Maxwell, who calls the area near St. David's South Austin Medical Center home, sang praises for the project's potential to revamp medical services in her district, having turned away previously 'just because it has been chronically underinvested.' However, while the planning powers-that-be are seeing the expansion in rosy hues, the South Menchaca neighborhood's representatives echoed concerns about potential community pitfalls, like discharged homeless patients. The community body floated ideas for St. David's to pitch in on local benefits, like bike lane surveys and bus passes, only to be outvoted as the rezoning sailed through without delay.
The new tag, Commercial Highway Services-Planned Development Area-Neighborhood Plan (CH-PDA-NP), hands St. David's more leeway to climb higher with their building plans, with permission to build up to 120 feet high, an opportunity the current 60-foot ceiling doesn't offer, St. David's reps argue these changes are critical, granting them the flexibility to navigate the headwinds of macroeconomic challenges, the Austin Monitor captured in a letter from St. David's counsel Michael Whellan to the Housing and Planning Department.
Despite existing concerns from locals, the drive behind the St. David's renovation juggernaut doesn't seem to be stalling. As they gear up to update the South Austin medical scene, this latest news comes hot on the heels of other developments, including brand-spanking new hospitals in Leander and Kyle, a behavioral health hospital near their North Austin facility, and a $249 million overhaul of the South Austin Medical Center itself, bringing in gleaming new operating rooms and much-needed bed space to serve Austin well into the future.
