SEMINOLE A major expansion of the Department of Veterans Affairs Hospital at Bay Pines to provide enhanced mental health and Post Traumatic Syndrome Disorder services will begin next year with $17.4 million in funds included in a veterans appropriations bill by U.S. Rep. C.W. Bill Young, R-Indian Shores, and approved by the House Appropriations Committee June 24.
We owe our past, our present and our future veterans the finest care possible, Young said, and this new facility responds to an urgent need for additional space and resources to provide mental health and post traumatic stress counseling and services.
The three-story, 156,000-square-foot addition to the main hospital building will include an Outpatient Mental Health Center of Excellence and a Post Traumatic Center of Excellence on the main level and replacement Inpatient Psychiatric and Geriatric Psychiatric bed wings on the second and third levels.
The addition of new space will allow for the renovation of 189,000 square feet of existing patient care space in a later project, which will be used for medical and surgical nursing wards and a modern psychiatric domiciliary.
Young also added $4.5 million to the VA appropriations bill for the hiring of an additional 20 inspectors for the VA Office of Inspector General, 10 of which will go to the newly established Inspector General facility at Bay Pines.
It was through an initiative sponsored by Young that the VA opened a major new VA Inspector General office at Bay Pines in May 2007 to expand oversight and investigation operations in Florida to ensure that veterans receive the finest in care.
