VA Silent On Future Home Of Brick Veterans' Clinic

BRICK, NJ — In July 2014, Congress approved giving the Department of Veterans Affairs $1.5 billion to improve health care for military veterans by expanding 27 clinics, including the James J. Howard Outpatient Clinic in Brick Township.

Four years after the Veterans Access, Choice, and Accountability Act of 2014 went into effect, veterans seeking care at the Brick facility still face long waits, woefully insufficient parking and other issues at the clinic that was built in 1991.

And it's still not known when a new site will be announced under a bid process to find a location for a 60,000-square-foot facility that started in April. At least four sites — two in Brick, two in Toms River — have been proposed, according to officials in the two towns. How many sites total are under consideration, and when a decision might be made, remain unanswered, however. Multiple emails to Veterans Administration officials seeking an update on the project have gone unanswered until Tuesday, when an email reply said questions were being forwarded to another spokesperson.

On Wednesday, a message was relayed from John Griffith, associate director of the VA's Lyons Campus, saying, "We have no update to report because the project is still in the procurement process and we in VA New Jersey are in a binding nondisclosure contractural agreement."

The statement directed questions to the contracting officer and project manager.

In the 27 years since the Howard clinic opened, the population that's served by the 34,000-square-foot facility has risen dramatically. The clinic was built with the expectation of serving 5,000 veterans, but in the years since, the veteran population of the area has skyrocketed along with the general population. An annex facility opened in 2015 to ease the strain, but the veteran population is simply too large for the facility to meet all of the need.

In an April email. Maryjo Apice, a spokesperson for the Veterans Affairs department, said New Jersey has nearly 47,000 veterans, including more than 9,500 in Brick.

In late April, the VA began seeking proposals for new sites to lease space for a facility with at least 60,000 square feet and 400 parking spaces. Among the parameters was keeping it geographically in the southern Monmouth-Ocean area, near existing hospitals/medical facilities and near public transportation.

Having the clinic in Brick long has been a source of pride for township officials, and Mayor John G. Ducey, at the time the bid solicitation was published, said he would like to see it stay in the township.

"We have a tremendous amount of veterans here and the convenience of the facility being close to home but also close to Ocean Medical Center is tantamount," Ducey said.

Toms River officials, however, have been excited about the prospect of drawing the facility to Toms River, the county seat. Toms River Councilman Maurice "Mo" Hill said bringing the clinic to Toms River and would be a benefit to veterans needing assistance with other services.

In August, officials from the VA visited the sites in Brick and in Toms River that officials said are under consideration.

In Brick, one proposal would put a new facility at the 10-acre property that's wedged between Jack Martin Boulevard and Route 88 and bounded on the third side by Burrsville Road. The property is zoned for hospital use and is less than a quarter-mile from Hackensack Meridian Ocean Medical Center. It's also about a mile from the site of the current clinic.

The second Brick Township site is a property on Cedar Bridge Avenue behind the Lowe's that fronts on Route 70. It is about 3 miles from Ocean Medical Center.

In Toms River, Township Planner David G. Roberts a developer pre-approved by the VA proposed two sites. One is near the Seacourt Pavilion and the second is believed to be a parcel on Route 37 near the St. Catherine Boulevard jughandle, he said. He said the second parcel is privately owned.

The Hooper Avenue parcel is just over 3 miles from Community Medical Center, the nearest hospital, and the Route 37 parcel is just under 3 miles from that hospital.

"It is our understanding that the VA may be advising of their 'short list' of preferred sites within a month, but that timeframe could change," Roberts said. "The township is very supportive of a VA clinic for our veterans and (we) believe that the township is an appropriate location for such a facility given the other nearby support services for veterans provided by the county."

The Ocean County Veterans Services office is on Hooper Avenue, not far from the Seacourt Pavilion parcel.

Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert Wilkie earlier this year said an initial round of bidding on clinic expansions "came in excessively high," so the VA revamped its bid specifications and simplified them in hopes of encouraging more competition and better opportunities to lease space in existing buildings.

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Note: This report has been updated with comment from the Veterans Administration.

A Google Maps photo shows cars lined up parked outside the James J. Howard Outpatient Clinic in Brick.