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New VA clinic rising in east Lincoln expected to open in 2021

The Lincoln Journal Star - 3/5/2020

Mar. 5----

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Crews expect to finish the new 72,000-square-foot Veterans Affairs outpatient clinic on the historic VA hospital grounds in east Lincoln by December, project officials said Wednesday.

"The muscle's not out there, but the bones of the structure (are) up," said George Achola of Burlington Capital, the company redeveloping the grounds into the Victory Park campus.

The new $23.9 million outpatient clinic replaces the old clinic operating in the former VA hospital and will include primary care, mental health services, telehealth care, specialty care, laboratory services, physical therapy, prosthetics and pharmacy management.

"We're extremely excited to see the new clinic rising from the VA campus in Lincoln after many years of planning," Duncan Fallon, site manager for the Lincoln VA outpatient clinic, said in a statement.

"Along with the construction, the staff of the VA in Lincoln have been working extremely hard to ensure that all the planning and coordination that needs to occur happens in a timely manner so that we will be ready to begin treating our first patients in early 2021."

A town hall meeting for veterans had been planned for Thursday evening in Lincoln and designed to give an update on the project's progress among other VA health care updates. But VA officials on Wednesday postponed the event out of caution over the coronavirus.

VA town hall postponed

For updates on the rescheduling of a town hall for Lincoln veterans and their families, veterans should watch the VA Nebraska-Western Iowa Health Care's website and Facebook page.

The website is Nebraska.va.gov, and the VA NWIHCS's Facebook page is at Facebook.com/NebraskaIowaVA.

Victory Park developers waited two years for a commitment from the VA that it would build a clinic on the Lincoln campus. The VA made the pledge in 2018 and developers broke ground last May.

The new clinic marks the cornerstone of the Victory Park redevelopment, Achola said.

This summer, crews hope to begin work on about 85 units of senior housing to the east of the clinic, he said.

Once the new clinic's complete, the overall $100 million redevelopment of the campus will only be a quarter of the way done, Achola said.

Burlington Capital officials are still exploring what they will do with the old VA hospital and looking for tenants for buildings with office space south of 70th and O streets, he said.

Reach the writer at 402-473-2657 or rjohnson@journalstar.com.

On Twitter @LJSRileyJohnson.

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