New building, funding drive on tap for KU Hospital

The University of Kansas Hospital announced plans Monday to build a 92-bed neurosciences and surgical oncology facility at its Kansas City, Kan., campus, and hospital officials said they have secured $3.5 million in philanthropic support for the project.

Hospital officials said civic leaders Deanna and Greg Graves have pledged $1 million towards the “Cambridge North” building, which is slated for construction at the northeast corner of 39th and Cambridge streets.

Greg Graves is chairman and CEO of Burns & McDonnell, a Kansas City–based architectural and engineering firm, and is also vice chair of the University of Kansas Hospital Authority Board. Hospital officials said the Burns & McDonnell Foundation, which the employee-owners of the company fund, has pledged $2.5 million for the building. That figure represents the largest allocation in the history of the foundation, which dates back to the late 1980s, according to a company spokesman.

The hospital estimates the project will cost about $250 million. Plans call for philanthropy to finance about 40 percent of the cost, said hospital spokesman Dennis McCulloch. The balance would come from operational revenue or bond financing, he said.

McCulloch said it’s too early in the fundraising effort to project a construction timetable.

According to the hospital, patient volume in neurosciences and surgical oncology has increased nearly 40 percent in the past five years.

Cambridge North would accommodate a projected growth in the hospital workforce, according to the hospital, with slots for about 100 new physicians and 600 new patient care jobs. The facility would include 28 intensive-care beds and a dozen operating rooms, along with imaging, lab and pharmacy services.

As an independent state authority, the hospital receives no state or local tax appropriations.

“This community must embrace its academic medical center and help it provide advanced medicine for patients,” Greg Graves said in a news release. “Deanna and I are thrilled to get things started, but we will need many other community leaders and organizations to step up to make this happen.”

Hospital President and CEO Bob Page lauded the Graves’s support.

“Deanna and Greg Graves are tremendous leaders in our area.  They see community needs and dedicate themselves to solving them,” Page said in the release.