The Ochsner Clinic Foundation filed advanced notices last week to Louisiana Economic Development regarding several projects in the works across the Capital Region.
The foundation filed 11 notices for the state’s Enterprise Zone program, a jobs incentive program that provides income and franchise tax credits. Roughly half the notices are for projects in the Capital Region, including three in Baton Rouge.
In Gonzales, notices were filed for Ochsner’s nearly 38,000-square-foot health center planned near La. 44 and La. 30, as well as for a new urgent care clinic—Baton Rouge Lagniappe Urgent Care Facility—on Airline Highway. Those projects are expected to cost $3.6 million and $1 million, respectively, and create five permanent new jobs at each location.
In Prairieville, Ochsner is planning a nearly 14,000-square-foot addition to its existing urgent care clinic to offer primary care and specialty clinics care, creating the new Prairieville Clinic Facility. The project is expected to cost some $2.5 million and create five permanent jobs.
In Baton Rouge, Ochsner filed notices for its urgent care center planned for the Highland Park Marketplace on Old Perkins Road, as well as for its 11,000-square-foot clinic under construction near the corner of Bluebonnet Boulevard and Burbank Drive.
Construction on the clinic began in July 2019 and was originally expected to open this past spring. In October, the Ochsner Clinic Foundation filed an advance notice for the state’s Enterprise Zone program, saying the clinic would create 25 new jobs. In the notices filed last week, Ochsner reported each project would create five new jobs.
The final Baton Rouge notice is for a 13,000-square-foot specialty pharmacy planned for Industrialplex Boulevard, in existing warehouse space. The business will include rental space, a call center, a packaging and distribution area and a loading dock to allow for large delivery trucks. Like the other projects, the facility is also expected to create five permanent jobs, according to the notices.
These projects are the latest in an aggressive series of expansions by the health system, which includes a 30,000-square-foot surgical hospital and 155,000-square-foot medical office building at Siegen Lane and Interstate 10 that opened earlier this year. In 2017, the $3.4 billion system completed a $13 million cancer center on its main campus on O’Neal Lane.
