Work continues on an effort to build a new Veterans Outreach Clinic in the Rochester area, although the timeline of that project has slipped a bit.
That according to David Price, the Acting Associate Medical Director at the VA in Canandaigua. Price says it now looks like the new clinic won't be completed until 2018 or 2019, a little longer than they originally had hoped for.
That's due to the locations that developers are considering right now.
“The sites that were offered in our solicitation all fall within what they call an archeologically sensitive area so the New York Division of Historic Preservation requires us to do some further investigation of those properties,” Price told WXXI News.
The VA says it's not yet able to reveal where the new clinic will be built. But it is one that officials and local veterans say is sorely needed, with the current clinic on Westfall Road having space problems and also not enough parking.
Price says he realizes why some local veterans are anxious to get the new clinic completed.
“They’re really stretched in that facility for the services that they currently provide, and parking is really a big issue , so we’ve been really pushing to get the replacement facility as soon as possible, just because of the current condition being really tight.”
Congresswoman Louise Slaughter, who secured the initial funding for the project, says she has been “very frustrated” by the slow pace of the progress the VA is making with the new clinic.Slaughter says she has met one-on-one with the Secretary of the VA, and Congressional officials to urge that next steps be taken quickly.
There is a second phase to the project that will house additional VA services at a facility in the Rochester area, but completion of that is likely several years down the road.
