VHC Health is getting close to submitting its plans for a new 146-bed facility along S. Carlin Springs Road.
The health care organization has received approval from state regulators for a facility with 96 behavioral health beds and 50 in-patient rehabilitation beds at 601 S. Carlin Springs Road.
VHC Health aims to file plans by early May — and says it has learned lessons from controversies around the ongoing expansion of its main campus on N. George Mason Drive.
“We learned a lot,” Adrian Stanton, vice president of real-estate acquisition and development at VHC Health, said at a Monday meeting of the Glencarlyn Civic Association. There, he and others associated with the project fielded questions ranging from parking to design.
VHC Health currently has 35 behavioral-health beds and 20 in-patient-rehab beds at its main campus on N. George Mason Drive, which would be moved to the new facility.
The organization has lined up a development partner in LifePoint Health, a Tennessee-based company that operates health care facilities nationwide. Earl Swensson Associates, also Tennessee-based, has been chosen as the architect for the 5.8-acre project.
Submission of the development proposal to county officials will start a process that will include a staff review, oversight by a site-plan review committee convened to evaluate the plan, and ultimate consideration by the Planning Commission and County Board.
Underscoring the importance of the project, County Manager Mark Schwartz and several planning staff attended this week’s meeting.
Schwartz said issues raised by the community will be taken into consideration during the development process. At the same time, he said a final decision on the proposal wasn’t in his hands.
“I can’t pre-suppose what the County Board is going to do,” Schwartz said.
Stanton said lessons learned during the last submission process will help guide this development effort.
“One of the big ones is noise,” he said. “We’ve got to do a better job of keeping that down. The other one we learned from that project is the issue of lighting.”
Glencarlyn Civic Association president Brandon Hemel said he hoped for a positive working relationship as the project moves from concept to implementation.
“The construction process may be painful along the way,” he told ARLnow after the meeting. “We all need to be vigilant to make sure that VHC Health and LifePoint stick to their construction plan once it is approved.”
While VHC Health has submitted some basic renderings to state officials, more detailed conceptual designs won’t be released publicly until the project is submitted to county officials.
Schwartz promised no delay in making those public.
“As soon as they submit something, you get to see it,” he said.
Hemel said traffic-management around the site is “a key area of concern.” He also pointed to security and safety issues and ensuring that the building fits in with its surroundings.
Melody Dickerson, the senior vice president of hospital operations and chief nursing officer at VHC Health, said the parcel’s location — adjacent to Long Branch Nature Center — would be a valuable asset to the services being provided there.
“The natural beauty of the setting creates a therapeutic environment,” she said. “[It is] the perfect setting for this patient population.”
Cleve Haralson, a senior vice president at LifePoint who participated in the meeting remotely, made the same point.
“It needs to really fit in with the surroundings, creates something that promotes healing,” Haralson said. “It’s just got to be beautiful.”
Hemel said his neighborhood welcomes the services that would be provided in the facility, including beds for youth requiring behavioral-health support.
“Adolescent care for addiction recovery and mental-health treatment is a sorely needed item in our society today, and I really hope that this new site will bring in a new paradigm of care,” he said.
The entire 11.6-acre site at 601 S. Carlin Springs Road previously had been owned by Virginia Hospital Center, which in 2019 traded it to the county government for a N. Edison Street parcel needed to expand its main campus.
In 2023, the hospital organization and county government signed an agreement for the renamed VHC Health to purchase back half of the Carlin Springs parcel, with the county government retaining the rest.
At the April 7 meeting, Schwartz said plans for use of the county’s portion of the site remain undetermined.
VHC Health will be responsible for providing up to 300 parking spaces, most of them underground, for use both by its new facility and any future government facility.
