Regents Approve $1.52 Billion UCSF Hospital

SAN FRANCISCO — University of California regents approved a $1.52 billion women’s, children’s, and cancer specialty hospital slated for the city’s Mission Bay district. The approval paves the way for construction of the 878,000-square-foot, 289-bed hospital, which work could begin on as early as December 2010.

 

Called "a major milestone" for the school by University of California, San Francisco, Chancellor Susan Desmond-Hellman, the hospital is slated for a 14.5-acre parcel on UCSF’s growing biomedical research campus in Mission Bay.

 

The new hospital is expected to be completed in 2014 and will house a 183-bed children’s facility with emergency and pediatric primary care and specialty outpatient facilities; a 70-bed adult hospital for cancer patients; and a women’s hospital with specialty surgery and select outpatient services, and a 36-bed birthing center. Also located on the site will be an energy plant and helipad.

 

The project is being supported by $375 million in philanthropic gifts, including $100 million from Marc Benioff, CEO and founder of Salesforce.com; a $125 million matching grant from Charles Feeney, founder of The Atlantic Philanthropies Foundation; and two anonymous gifts of $25 million each.

 

School officials anticipate using $220 million of UCSF’s own monies to pay for the project. The rest of the funding will come from some $600 million in anticipated gifts and $69 million in bonds set aside in a November 2008 ballot initiative.

 

Mark Laret, CEO of UCSF Medical Center and the UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital, has stated that the new hospital will create hundreds of construction jobs and require the hiring of more than 1,000 employees to operate. UCSF’s existing medical center, which lacks proper space, accounts for one in three jobs at the university.

 

UCSF is working with architects Anshen + Allen and William McDonough + Partners, both of San Francisco. DPR Construction of San Francisco is the general contractor for the project; Cambridge CM of Palo Alto, Calif., is providing construction management services.