Valley Regional Hospital’s proposal to renovate a four-story building on the hospital campus to make it housing for visiting nurses and other staff took a step forward this week when the planning committee granted the hospital a waiver of plan approval for renovations.
The renovation aims to help solve a barrier to hiring: the severe housing shortage in the region. The hospital has struggled to hire nurses, and in the long term, workers are unable to find adequate housing.
Bids for the $1. 2 million allocation, partially funded through the Northern Region Boundary Commission, are expected later this month, Alan Owens, Valley Regional’s senior director of amenities and services, said Tuesday. Hospital officials hope the allocation can be finalized by the end of the year, Owens said.
The hospital will reconfigure the four-story construction on four of Dunning St. to include two apartments on the second and third floors, with a dormitory-style configuration on the fourth floor with four bedrooms and a shared kitchen, according to the online application. file with the Department of Planning and Urban Development.
The building was built in the early 20th century and was originally a dormitory for nursing students when there was a nursing school at the hospital.
Since no adjustments are proposed to the parking lot or exterior of the building, city planner Christina Warner said in a memo to the planning board, which was considered as the variance request at a meeting on Monday, that the internal adjustments will not replace the existing ones. The site plan, and therefore this plan, “is sufficient for the purposes of this renovation. “The site plan is for the construction built in the 1990s, adjacent to the brick construction and housing Associates in Medicine, a number one care provider affiliated with the hospital.
Meanwhile, plans for the construction of a new workplace for doctors across the street from the hospital’s main front on Elm Street are expected to begin moving forward after the New Hampshire attorney general’s workplace last week approved a plan for Valley Regional to enroll in Dartmouth’s fitness system. The Merrimack Superior Court also approved the settlement. Now, each entity’s administrators’ forums will have to conduct due diligence before the final scheduled for July.
As a component of the agreement, aimed at mitigating the effects of the festival’s integration into the region’s physical care facilities, Dartmouth Health agreed to build a must-have facility in Valley Regional for at least a decade and fund the planned 23,800-square-foot medical facility. Internship building on the hospital campus.
The new building, with an estimated value of $20 million, will be a modern space that will better meet the needs of electricity and technology, Owens said last year.
The plan includes 35 exam rooms, orthopedics, an X-ray area, common areas and meeting rooms, all designed to provide more space for patients and staff. Once completed, all primary care would be transferred to the new area. Number one care is provided at 3 other locations.
Although the planning committee approved the site plan for construction last June, there is still a lot of painting to be done before Valley Regional can begin construction, Owens said Tuesday.
“We know the structure is going to be put in place, but as far as timing, we don’t know yet,” Owens said.
Owens said he expects that in the coming months, Valley regional officials will have several meetings with Dartmouth Health, while at the same time finalizing structural documents. It will most likely be at least a year before the paintings begin and the structural era ends. It’s expected to last about 18 months, he said.
The integration agreement also calls for DH to establish a drug treatment center in Valley Regional and operate it for at least 10 years.
It also requires DH, the state’s largest personal employer, to contribute $2 million to the Health Care Consumer Protection Trust Fund, which lawmakers created last year to help monitor the health care market, inform policy and value transparency.
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