Neighborhood Health launches $20M campaign for Fort Wayne clinic
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A Fort Wayne public health provider has big ideas for a closed school in the city’s southeast Oxford neighborhood. Now, they’re seeking financial backing to make it happen with the $20 million Oxford Project capital campaign.
Neighborhood Health — a fixture in the Fort Wayne community for more than 50 years — scooped up Fort Wayne Community Schools’ L.C. Ward Education Center in 2021.
The one-time elementary school closed in 2017 and sat unused for years in a high poverty area where Neighborhood Health leaders say the need for low-cost, accessible health care is great. The Oxford area’s 46806 zip code, for example, ranks among the highest in the state for infant mortality. Over half of these pregnant mothers did not receive early prenatal care, according to Neighborhood Health.
“It is really alarming when you see the trend lines and the differences with that particular area,” Neighborhood Health CEO Angie Zaegel said. “So we’re excited about going in there with a very unique, integrated health care model where we are bringing full medical care.”
Ward is within walking distance of many Oxford families and quickly became a standout location for Neighborhood Health, which is outgrowing its two existing Fort Wayne locations.
Oxford Project campaign co-chair Jerry Henry explains significance of the Oxford location.
Neighborhood Health is a $20 million organization with 190 employees, Zaegel said. It accepts federal public health service money to provide affordable health care to low income patients in two Fort Wayne locations. It also has centers in neighboring DeKalb, Noble and Whitley counties to support federal WIC program recipients.
Leaders of the local health provider struck a deal with Fort Wayne Community Schools a couple years ago to buy the Ward school for $10, Zaegel said, and help the district avoid $243,000 in demolition costs.
Zaegel said she and other leaders first got into the building about a year ago and started charting out their plans. They envision a full service health center that offers everything from prenatal to senior care.
Upon completed renovations, the building will house health and dental clinics, sensory rooms, resources for federal WIC recipients, and an 1,800 square-foot community center open to the public.
That’s a space Zaegel envisions could be opened up to the public, used occasionally as a Neighborhood Health staff conference space, or even transformed into the mass vaccination site. Taking a note from the 2020 pandemic, Zaegel says design for the building will also include a separate entrance leading to multiple negative air pressure exam rooms for treatment of infectious diseases.
The health staff is also looking to prepare its staff for a diverse scope of patients. Neighborhood Health recently sent members of its team to New York University to be trained on how best to offer specialized services to patients with autism and other intellectual disabilities.
“There’s a lot of innovative things that we have new to Fort Wayne and, frankly, there’s not really that many in the state of Indiana,” Zaegel said.
Angie Zaegel describes design of new Neighborhood Health clinic.
The Neighborhood Health team has begun raising money for the $20 million project. So far, they’ve secured a $2.5 million grant from the Allen County-Fort Wayne Capital Improvement Board and $1 million from individual donors, and anticipate receiving approvals soon from the city for an additional $2 million. But, Ben Eisbart, recently named a co-chair of the new Oxford Project capital campaign, acknowledges there’s a long way to go.
He and fellow co-chair Jerry Henry say they will also seek additional donors and tax credits. Once funding is secured, renovations could take between nine to 16 months, Zaegel said.
Not only will the project offer much needed health services to Fort Wayne’s Oxford area, Neighborhood Health leaders also envision the health clinic as both a health care industry incubator and job creator.
Sixty jobs will be created through the project, Zaegel said, adding another 100 are likely to follow indirectly. Neighborhood Health partners locally with the Indiana University School of Dentistry to place students in a community health dental rotation, as well as the Fort Wayne Medical Education Program to train medical residents in prenatal care. The service’s centers also sees other students pursuing nursing, behavioral health and other multidisciplinary studies.
“If you’ve been to Fort Wayne, you’ll notice that there’s been a whole host of activity downtown, along our rivers, which has transformed the downtown,” Eisbart said. “Now, we’re looking to transform neighborhoods and sectors of the community that sorely need it and this is a great example. It’s a win-win-win for the entire community.”
For more information about the Oxford Project, see Neighborhood Health’s website at mynhfw.org.