Plans include a cancer center, more research space in the Institute for Human Performance, renovation of two downtown apartment buildings and a new nursing school.
Work on the Upstate Medical University's biotechnology center (the former Kennedy Square apartment complex) along East Fayette Street has been halted as the university awaits state legislature approval. Dr. David Smith, president of Upstate, said the delayed project is a good example why his facility needs more flexibility from state regulations and approvals. Syracuse, N.Y. -- Upstate Medical University has about about $225 million worth of construction projects in the pipeline as part of an aggressive effort to enlarge its Syracuse campus.
Those projects include a cancer center, an expansion of research space in the Institute for Human Performance building at 505 Irving Ave., renovation of two downtown apartment buildings and a new nursing school. Some of them will begin in the next few months.
Dr. David Smith, Upstate’s president, said the academic medical center needs the additional space to accommodate increases in student enrollment, patient volume and research activity. Smith talked about the projects today at the Thursday Morning Roundtable at Drumlins during a presentation on Upstate’s economic impact.
Smith, a former Texan, said his mantra at Upstate has become, “Get ‘er done.” He said Upstate has money for the projects in the bank.
“It’s an exciting time and there are a lot of things moving,” he said.
David Smith, president of Upstate Medical UniversityUpstate will break ground on the cancer center next month. It will go up along East Adams Street just west of the Upstate University Hospital entrance. The Institute for Human Performance expansion will begin early next year. Renovations of the Harrison House and Townsend Tower apartment buildings downtown will begin later this year. Upstate will convert them into student housing. Construction will begin in 2012 on a new college of nursing west of Upstate’s Weiskotten Hall. That college now occupies space on the Hutchings Psychiatric Center campus.
Smith said the academic medical center is growing so it can provide more doctors, nurses and other health care professionals to upstate communities struggling with shortages of health care workers. It is also growing so it can generate more revenue to offset decreases in state funding, he said.
Upstate, which has about 8,100 people on its payroll, is the area’s largest employer.
The academic medical center, which has a $1.1 billion budget, is part of the State University of New York. It gets less than 10 percent of its revenue from New York. That percentage is expected to continue shrinking because of state budget cuts, according to Smith. The dwindling state support prompted this crack from Smith:
“We’re right now a private university with a noble public mission regulated like a state agency.”
Smith said he never wants to see Upstate privatized, but he would like to see the state give it more flexibility to do business with private companies.
Last year Upstate took over the former Kennedy Square housing complex between East Fayette and East Water streets where it and SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry are building a biotechnology research center on a portion of the property. Efforts to get the rest of the property redeveloped have been delayed because Upstate cannot solicit proposals from developers until it gets the OK from the state Legislature. Smith said there are five developers interested in the site. He called Kennedy Square “the poster child for the lack of flexibility.”
Smith said Upstate’s 409-bed hospital is running at nearly 100 percent occupancy.
To increase its capacity Upstate is trying to buy 306-bed Community General Hospital on Onondaga Hill. Smith said preliminary discussions with Community are going well. Upstate has reviewed credit reports on Community and “... we’re not seeing anything that is a show stopper,” he said.
“They’ve (Community) seen a fall off in volume and they are worried about an end point there financially,” Smith said. “I don’t want to see another 1,100 job loss in the community.”