Barring any other changes, Wesley Chapel will soon have two hospitals, as BayCare Health System has filed plans with Pasco County to build a new facility right up the road from AdventHealth Wesley Chapel.
The new 60-bed facility will be built on land BayCare has owned for more than a decade on Bruce B. Downs Blvd. at Eagelston Blvd., on the northern end of the Seven Oaks community, less than a mile south of S.R. 54, just south of the under-construction Blue Heron Senior Living Community (see map).
According to plans filed with the county, a pre-application meeting was scheduled to be held Dec. 9.
If a new BayCare hospital facility in Wesley Chapel sounds familiar, it should. The company originally met with county planners in 2018, looking to build a 60-bed acute care hospital on an 111-acre site it had planned to acquire in the northeast quadrant of the now-planned I-75 exit at Overpass Rd.
Despite receiving preliminary approval from the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA), BayCare’s efforts were opposed by AdventHealth, on the grounds that there was ample service provided to the area by its Wesley Chapel location, as well as its other hospitals in Dade City and Zephyrhills, both very close to northern Wesley Chapel.
The Florida Legislature, however, eliminated the requirement for a Certificate of Need last spring, expanding BayCare’s options.
BayCare purchased 34.6 acres of the planned new site for $15 million in 2006, and then paid $6.67 million for an adjoining 19.9-acre parcel in 2007, for a total of 54.5 acres, for a combined $21.67 million, according to county property records.
Also in 2007, BayCare purchased an 18.25-acres parcel of land across Eagleston and west of BBD for $9.4 million, so expansion could already be in the works.
BayCare’s current plans filed with the county show the acute-care hospital, an emergency department, observation rooms, medical office building and an ambulatory surgery center.
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