UF Health Jacksonville was cleared to start construction on its six-story, 210,000-square foot North Jacksonville medical office building at a construction cost of $27.7 million.
The City approved the construction permit Friday for the building at 15255 Max Leggett Parkway at River City Marketplace. Perry-McCall Construction Inc. is the contractor.
UF Health Jacksonville has said it intended to break ground midsummer and complete construction about year-end 2014. The project is at Interstate 95 and Duval Road, also known as Max Leggett Parkway in the marketplace area.
The organization, formerly called UF&Shands Jacksonville, has estimated a development cost of $60 million to $65 million for the building, which will house medical offices, ambulatory services and outpatient diagnostic services.
The medical office building is separate from the proposed 100-bed inpatient hospital UF Health Jacksonville had proposed at the site.
The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration withdrew its support for the hospital and UF Health has said it would continue with development of the medical office building.
The medical office building does not require state approval.
As reported, the first and second floors will be used by UF Health for an emergency department, urgent care, imaging services, a laboratory, women’s health, operating rooms and interventional rooms. That space is about 122,000 square feet.
The third through sixth floors will provide offices for UF faculty and community private physicians. Those four floors total about 80,000 square feet of space.
UF Health Jacksonville owns the property and has a ground lease with developer Landmark Healthcare Facilities LLC of Milwaukee, Wis., UF Health Jacksonville spokesman Daniel Leveton has said.
As the developer, Landmark will secure funding and build the structure. UF Health and the private physicians will be tenants, Leveton said.
UF Health says the leases extend more than 50 years, at which time ownership of the building will revert to UF Health.
Plans were submitted to the City in June for UF Health Jacksonville North and for the core and shell permit only, meaning the interior build-out will be permitted separately.
The organization previously filed plans with the St. Johns River Water Management District for that first phase of its North Campus.
The plans filed with the water management district show the project on a 69.6-acre site east of I-95 along Duval Road. The construction permit specifies a 14-acre site.
The building-permit application lists the project owner as Jacksonville Medical Office Building LLC, which is part of Landmark Healthcare Facilities.
Landmark is the developer and owner of the building, according to UF Health.
The property appraiser’s office lists Shands Jacksonville Foundation Inc. as the owner of the property.
The Jacksonville project civil engineer is England, Thims & Miller Inc. The project designer is Gresham, Smith and Partners.
Shands Jacksonville has proposed a hospital tower on the site. In December 2011, the agency issued a provisional certificate of need for construction of the inpatient facility, but Memorial Hospital/HCA appealed the decision.
Last December, administrative law Judge W. David Watkins of Tallahassee recommended that, because the new hospital could cost Memorial $3.5 million to $4.9 million a year, the state should not allow the hospital to be built.
Agency officials decided to follow that recommendation.
The 100-bed facility was designed to include private rooms, an emergency department, obstetrics, general surgery and advanced imaging.
On Dec. 10, UF&Shands Jacksonville officials announced construction would begin on the North Jacksonville medical complex despite the decision that day by the state administrative judge approving the appeal filed by Memorial Hospital.
“While we are disappointed in the court’s ruling, we strongly believe that a new health care facility in North Jacksonville is important for the communities of northern Duval County and south Georgia, offering a needed resource closer to where area residents work and live,” said Dr. David Guzick, then the senior vice president for health affairs at the University of Florida and president of the UF&Shands Health System, in a news release.
His new title is senior vice president for health affairs and president of UF Health.
The estimated cost for the new hospital was about $125 million. Project funding was identified as a combination of retained earnings, philanthropy and bond financing.
On May 21, UF&Shands, the University of Florida Academic Health Center, announced it would be known as University of Florida Health. Guzick said in a news release the move to “UF Health” came from extensive research the past year.
The name change does not mean a merger or acquisition between UF and Shands, nor does it alter day-to-day operations, the organization said.
Both are legally separate organizations whose governance and leadership structures remain the same. Employees will continue to be employed either by the university or by Shands.
UF Health is a collaboration of the UF Health Science Center and Shands.
“The Shands name will continue to be front and center for our hospitals and programs in Gainesville,” said Timothy Goldfarb, CEO of Shands HealthCare.
However, the system’s Jacksonville-based hospital, Shands Jacksonville, became UF Health Jacksonville while remaining a separate private hospital corporation working closely with the university.
UF Health’s Jacksonville hospital is at 655 W. Eighth St.
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