The Roseburg Veterans Affairs Healthcare System is in the planning stages of building a clinic behind Safeway in North Bend. The clinic will replace the VA's Bandon site and is expected to open by the end of this year or early next year.-World Photo by Jolene Guzman

NORTH BEND — The Veterans Affairs Roseburg Healthcare System will soon build a foundation for services in North Bend.

The Roseburg VA is planning to close its Bandon clinic to build a bigger facility in Coos County and has settled on a site next to the Pony Village Mall near the intersection of Marion Avenue and 12th Street. It will be just shy of 10,000 square feet, about 4,000 square feet larger than the space in Bandon, a press release said. The new clinic will provide non-urgent primary care and mental health services to more than 2,000 veterans.

Sharon Carlson, assistant to the VA director, said the new facility will be built for speed. The clinic will have the same amount of staff as currently working in Bandon. But the difference will be building layout.

“The larger square footage will allow for more efficiency for providers,” Carlson said.

The design will include more patient exam rooms so doctors can move more quick from patient to patient.

The new building will be finished late this year or early next. The Bandon facility will remain open until the new clinic is up and running.

In addition to providing more space and quicker service, the VA wanted to move its South Coast clinic closer to where most of the veterans in the area live.

“Sixty percent of the patients we serve were from the North Bend-Coos Bay area,” Carlson said.

Kathy Laird, the chief executive officer of the Waterfall Community Health Center in North Bend, said she is unsure how many veterans her clinic sees. Waterfall just started tracking the number of vets coming in about two weeks ago, but even for those who do use Waterfall, the move will make it easier to get the services they need.

“It’s a great idea,” Laird said.  “Rising transportation costs make it prohibitive for some individuals to make that trip.”

Waterfall office manager Kathleen Olson said veterans with only prescription coverage through the VA often face the dilemma of making appointments at Waterfall and then having to go down to Bandon to get medications. With the new clinic, they no longer will have to face that challenge, she said.

When the time comes to move, Carlson said they hope to get it all done in a weekend, which will not interrupt service to patients. All furniture, equipment and supplies will need to be moved from the Bandon site to the new clinic.

The VA is working with an architect on design options. The process has just started, but Carlson said informational meetings sharing the design concept will be scheduled in Bandon and North Bend soon.

“We are very pleased to have this opportunity to provide quality care in a state-of-the-art facility (in a location) where a majority of the veterans reside,” Director of the Roseburg VA Susan Yeager said in a press release.