Project Impacts:
- Improvements to an existing structure that was once a community hospital
- Space to be leased to five medical care related business tenants
- 80 beds in a rehabilitation center equipped to serve 1,500-1,600 patients annually
- Create 133 direct jobs
- Programs geared toward older residents within an underserved community
PARTNERS:
NCIF: $6MM in NMTC allocation
CDFI Partner: $3MM PNC
Lead Bank: Asian Bank: $2.50MM (Phase 1) $1.50MM (Phase 2)
The Silvercare Medical Campus scope includes improvements to an existing structure that was once a community hospital creating space to be leased to five medical care related business tenants. Once completed Silvercare will include 80 beds in a rehabilitation center equipped to serve 1,500-1,600 patients annually and is expected to create 133 direct jobs.
The project site is located in Chester, Pennsylvania, in Delaware County and with a population of 32,605. Incorporated in 1682, Chester is the oldest city in Pennsylvania. Chester evolved over the centuries from a small town with wooden shipbuilding and textile factories into an industrial powerhouse producing steel ships for two World Wars and a myriad of consumer goods. Since the mid-twentieth century, it has lost its manufacturing base and over half of its residents and devolved into a post-industrial city with pollution, poverty, and crime.
Programs provided at Silvercare Medical Campus are geared toward older residents within this underserved community. Chester is an Act 47 region in Pennsylvania where the life expectancy of people living there is about 20 years shorter than that of people living in wealthier areas in the same county, such as Concord Township. The gap is medical care, which was amplified when additional facilities were closed. This trend began when the private equity firm that owned the community hospital chose to close the facility which then led to other surrounding businesses closing.
In the past 30 years, doctors have retired or moved out of Chester, and no new doctors have moved in. It is anticipated that 66% of Silvercare’s patient population are Medicaid patients.