BEXAR COUNTY, Tezas – Long before Thursday’s groundbreaking for its new 54-bed acute care community hospital in Westover Hills, Allen Harrison, president and CEO of Methodist Healthcare, said they saw the record growth coming to west Bexar County.
The hospital and a medical office building will be on land acquired 15 years ago at Loop 1604 and Highway 151 for its Westover Hills medical campus.
“With more than 423,000 citizens in this patient service area, the population requiring care is larger than the city of Corpus Christi,” Harrison said.
Harrison said it’s predicted west Bexar County will grow even more over the next five years.
“An estimated 9.3% increase in residents,” he said. “That’s 40,000 additional lives to service by 2026.
Up until now, Methodist Healthcare has had a free-standing emergency department at the Westover Hills site.
In a statement, Rebecca Clay-Flores, Precinct 1 Bexar County commissioner, said, “COVID highlighted how vital it is (to) have essential resources that our community needs.”
She said the new Methodist Healthcare facility will offer west Bexar County residents “a much needed service and will encourage continued economic growth in precinct one.”
However, with more growth comes more traffic congestion, Clay-Flores said.
Clay-Flores said she and her staff are working with the Bexar County public works department to fund road construction, study the impact growth is having on infrastructure and reduce future congestion.
To do that, she said Precinct 1 is investing $227 million over the next 10 years.
She said west Bexar County is seeing more and more economic activity.
“But we are working to bring more county services to keep up with the growth,” Clay-Flores said.