Jul 24, 2009

Building starts on cancer center

$23 million independently owned cancer center being built

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By: Jan Falstad, Billings Gazette

June 30, 2009

With the chicken coop, the milking shed and a little house once used by farmhands out of the way, a group of nine Billings-area doctors has started construction on a multimillion-dollar cancer center northeast of the Peter Yegen Jr. Golf Course.

Dr. Patrick Cobb, managing partner for the Hematology Oncology Centers of the Northern Rockies, and his partners spent two years planning a cancer treatment facility to offer the latest technology and more convenience to patients.

"Their two biggest complaints is traffic and parking, and we take care of those being outside the medical corridor," Cobb said.

Cancer treatments are largely outpatient, so the facilities don't have to be adjacent to hospitals.

At present, Hematology Oncology is located in the Yellowstone Medical Center complex on North 30th Street. In addition to changing locations, the practice also is changing its name to Frontier Cancer Centers and Blood Institute.

Construction on the 39,000-square-foot cancer center on the south side of Grand Avenue between 32nd Street West and Zimmerman Trail was supposed to begin in February, but work was delayed due to negotiations over financing.

"We had worked with a bank here, and things didn't go well with that," Cobb said. "We had to find alternative financing, and the folks at Stockman Bank have been fantastic."

The $23 million cancer center is being financed privately: $5 million for the medical equipment and fixtures from Elekta Capital in Pennsylvania, nearly $11 million from locally owned Stockman Bank and the balance of nearly $7 million from the Montana Board of Investments.

The Frontier cancer center will combine chemotherapy, radiation and support services and conduct research and clinical trials. However, taking on that debt doesn't mean that the practice has to grow substantially, Cobb said.

"We built this for what we think our patient expectations are, what we have now and some growth in the future," he said.

For more than two decades, Billings Clinic and St. Vincent Healthcare have cooperated, rather than competed, in radiation treatment by jointly operating the Northern Cancer Radiation Oncology Center at 1041 N. 29th St.

But Billings Clinic is completing its own cancer center, including radiation services, a $30 million downtown facility expected to open Aug. 10.

On Jan. 1, St. Vincent Healthcare took over full responsibility for the Northern Cancer Center, said spokeswoman Tracy Neary.

Frontier was designed and is being built by the Erdman Co., headquartered in Madison, Wis. Senior Project Manager Jim Joyce said his company will hire at least 16 local subcontractors and will hire out-of-state companies only for specialized work that cannot be done locally.

After the building site is stabilized, the footings and foundation will be poured in July and August. Structural steel will go up in September. By November, crews will be working on the interior, and the cancer center will be ready for use by mid-summer 2010.

"The intent is to recycle or divert as much of the construction debris as possible" by using trash bins to separate the steel, wood and other construction materials, Joyce said.

On June 5, the Yegen family sold 6.5 acres at 32nd Street West and Grand Avenue to the doctors' group. On June 19, Huppert Construction Co. of Billings started clearing more than 20 trees and the old buildings. Erdman Co. officially started site preparation work on June 22.

Title search fees for land sales like these are based on the price, which wasn't disclosed. But whatever the fee, the title company had a minimal amount of work on this deal. There just wasn't much of a title trail.

Billings insurance agent Charlie Yegen's great-grandfather, Irishman Edward Cardwell, bought the land in the spring of 1889, just months before Montana became the 41st state.

"It was a clean title. There was the U.S. government and the president (probably President Benjamin Harrison) and then granddad," Yegen said.

Charlie Yegen said his family made an exception for this project and sold land in the middle of this summer's crops.

"We're agriculturalists, but we liked them and we liked what they are doing," he said. "Dr. Cobb's passion for this project shows through."