Members of One Health’s Powell office and its partners raced against the rain as ground was officially broken on One Health’s new location, the Fitch Building, which was purchased by the health care provider two years ago.

The June 26 event signaled the beginning of the end for the organization’s sprawling downtown footprint. For the past several years, One Health has occupied three spaces on North Bent Street that have been adapted for patient care.

The new One Health office will be completed mid December and staff hope to be moved into the space sometime around the new year, Chief Financial Officer Colette Mild said.

In the meantime One Health is still open downtown and has a record number of patients — about 1,000, Mild said.

“It’s really the culmination of a lot of people and a lot of hard work,” she said. 

During the groundbreaking, One Health CEO David Mark was present as well as several other partners in the project including the One Health board of directors, staff, and those involved in the design and construction of the new office. 

As previously reported by the Tribune the downtown buildings rented by One Health have undergone consistent renovations in order to turn former office spaces (one was an orthodontist office) into patient care spaces. But as staff adapted the downtown locations to their needs, planning was underway for their new location where everything would be under one roof. 

“It’ll be wonderful for our patients and our staff to be in a clinic that was built for them, and it was built utilizing our current information about what has worked and what hasn’t worked, what is desired by both patients and staff,” Mild said.

She added that there isn’t a community more deserving of having a clinic built for them.

The new location comes with quite a few upgrades, and eventually there will even be a dentist office, although this will be added in a phased approach, Mild said.

“It’s going to be all prepped and ready to be opened up, but we won’t have dental immediately when we move in, just because it can be hard to find a dentist — it’s different than medical in terms of the payer sources and funding for dental operations,” Mild said.

One of the most important upgrades is square footage; the health care provider is “really packed” in its existing offices, One Health Clinical Operations Director Ashley Jarrett said. When the move is complete in 2025 patients and staff will be stepping into 11,000 square feet compared to the 3,300 square feet staff currently occupy. 

“I think the biggest thing that [patients and staff are] looking forward to is extra space. We do a really good job of seeing a lot of people in our creative and small spaces, but having room to do so and and doing so in a more organized, planned way will be of great benefit,” Associate Vice President of Medicine and Behavioral Health  Dr. Sarah Sowerwine-Fitzgerald said. 

The new building will also have its own parking, Jarrett said. At the Bent Street offices parking is shared with other downtown businesses.

“We’re going to have a big parking lot that’s only ours versus having to fight the downtown traffic,” Jarrett said. “We're also going to have an area where patients can pull up and come in to the backside if they want, and [we’ll] have some bigger procedure rooms in the back  where patients can park right up next to the door without having to get over a curb, which will be wonderful.”

The building will also be more accessible by wheelchair, she added. It will not be as crowded coming in and going out of the building and the bathrooms will be more accessible as well. An added bonus is that patients and staff will not have to leave one building to go to another, especially in the winter, Sowerwine-Fitzgerald said.

The building will also have a negative pressure room which will contain the spread of germs during virus season.

While the new building has its advantages, including its proximity to Powell High School with whom they’ve partnered on school-based programs, it's sad to leave downtown Powell, Sowerwine-Fitzgerald said.

“I think it’s because we’re central downtown, we have started down here, and it feels like we’re part of the footprint of downtown,” she said.