Planned expansion will
require zoning assistance
BY LINDA DeNICOLA
Staff Writer
FREEHOLD TOWNSHIP — Centra-State Medical Center administrators are planning to expand the West Main Street campus onto property that is being purchased from Verizon.
The Verizon parcel is 77 acres, but initial plans call for the development of about 3 acres adjacent to the existing hospital. The remainder of the tract would be left for unplanned future uses.
At the Aug. 10 Township Committee workshop meeting, municipal officials discussed amending the Professional (P-1) and Research, Office and Laboratory (ROL) zones to permit planned medical support services development and telecommunications so that Verizon can continue its current use.
Last week, Mayor Dorothy Avallone said the committee is still discussing the matter and looking at some of the uses.
The possible permitted uses are many and varied. They include office buildings, professional, scientific and technical services, doctor’s offices and social services. Also included are pharmacies, nursing homes, schools related to medicine, dormitories for medical students, ancillary retail uses, day care centers and others.
The Verizon parcel is in the ROL zone. CentraState administrators want to expand the hospital facilities onto a portion of the property that is being purchased from Verizon, but they need a zoning change and they need it as quickly as possible because the medical center is under a contractual obligation to obtain subdivision approval by October.
CentraState Healthcare System is planning to build a health awareness center on the 3-acre parcel and to move the services that are currently being provided at the health awareness center on Gibson Place to the new facility.
According to CentraState President and Chief Executive Officer John T. Gribbin, administrators are planning what he called an ambulatory campus of one or more buildings which would work together to offer outpatient-type services.
The new structure would be attached to the main hospital, probably three or four stories high and set back a bit, he said, adding that the hope is that the building will be done in about two years.
"We’ll be putting in a medical fitness program with a gym, pool and health club. It will have additional physicians’ offices and cardiac diagnostic services. We are also going to move the dialysis program out of the hospital. It will enable us to renovate the space the dialysis program vacates and add some additional beds and fix our critical care unit without having to build additional inpatient space," Gribbin said.