PAWTUCKET A developer that wants to build a veterans housing and education center at the former Memorial Hospital has closed on purchasing the site, according to Mayor Donald R. Grebien, who facilitated the deal with the former hospital s owner.
A news release Tuesday from Grebien announcing the closing did not include how much Lockwood Development Partners is paying to acquire the site from Care New England, which operates several facilities in Rhode Island, including Kent and Women & Infants Hospitals.
The $70-million project is expected to have 200 apartments on a 390,000-square-foot campus. It is expected to include a healthcare facility for therapy and social services; a career training program for veterans entering the civilian workforce; and a dormitory for veterans participating in the career training program. It will also have medical and lab space to serve the needs of veterans as well as the community as a whole.
1/26/2021
NEW: Developer purchases former Memorial Hospital site
PAWTUCKET – Eighteen months after Lockwood Development Partners signed a purchase and sale agreement on the former Memorial Hospital property on Brewster Street, the developer has closed the deal with Care New England.
Lockwood is planning a housing complex for veterans and an education center, according to an announcement circulating among lawmakers this week from Pawtucket Mayor Donald Grebien and Lockwood President Charles Everhardt.
“The city of Pawtucket has long supported the redevelopment of the underutilized former Memorial Hospital site to a project that benefits and meets the community’s needs,” said Grebien, who originally introduced Lockwood officials to representatives at Care New England, in a statement. “We thank Charles and his team for their transformational vision to bring a veterans’ facility and the ancillary economic development that it will create to our community. The city will als
A failed program under Raimondo needs to be fixed under McKee.
Rhode Island should be the state that is most efficient at implementing a comprehensive vaccination program. Just a little more than 1 million people are all living within 55 miles of one another.
But, the program has been mismanaged and is now turning into another Rhode Island failure.
According to the CDC, Rhode Island has received 149,255 doses.
The Rhode Island Department of Health has only administered 42% of the doses 63,249 doses.
The program now six weeks old has yet to vaccinate more than 3,000 a day.
There are no drive-up vaccinations. There are no mass vaccinations.
Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo vaccinated; AG probes hospital vaccine distribution
Updated Jan 22, 2021;
Rhode Island’s attorney general is reviewing whether the state’s largest hospital operators are properly distributing COVID vaccines.
The Providence Journal reports state Attorney General Peter Neronha’s office has been in contact with the state Department of Health regarding the distribution of vaccines by Lifespan and Care New England.
Kristy dosReis, a spokesperson for Neronha, told the newspaper that the office intends to look into any improper distribution and determine whether legal violations occurred.
The Journal previously reported that board members and trustees at the two hospital groups have been offered vaccinations, even as elderly residents won’t receive the vaccine until at least next month, under the state’s vaccine distribution plan.