Springfield council approves annexation for behavioral health campus 

In a unanimous vote, the Springfield City Council Monday, Nov. 2, paved the way for the state’s first behavioral health campus with both a crisis stabilization center and psychiatric hospital on site. 

The decision was met with applause from the crowd gathered in council chambers. 

“I think this can truly be something that is not just a benefit to our community, but really an example to what can be done in the state,” Councilor Andrew Buck said during a work session ahead of the vote. 

The councilors’ vote approved an annexation request from PeaceHealth and Lane County, which purchased adjoining lots in northwest Springfield and filed an application to annex the properties into city limits. The vote was 5-0, with Councilor Alan Stout excused for the evening. 

The vacant lots on International Way, about a mile from PeaceHealth Sacred Heart Medical Center at RiverBend, were in unincorporated Lane County but within Springfield’s urban growth boundary. Annexing into the city allows for the extension of city streets and services.

Councilors discussed the request at seven meetings, deliberating on criteria of approval in the city’s development code, including that the proposed annexation be consistent with the city’s comprehensive plan. 

The annexation decision is the only time the council will weigh in on the behavioral health campus proposal because of a new state law that allows stabilization centers to bypass city plan amendments and zone changes if they’re built alongside behavioral health hospitals. 

The law is crucial to the International Way project because the area is designated for “campus industrial” uses in the city’s comprehensive plan. The 18-acre property sits between a FedEx Ship Center and Richardson Sports.

PeaceHealth plans to build a 96-bed facility called Timber Springs Behavioral Health Hospital, expanding access for adults needing inpatient care and creating beds that don’t currently exist for youths in Lane County. Currently, adolescents needing psychiatric care are sent as far away as Portland. 

Lane County is planning the crisis stabilization center, a 24-hour emergency room for mental health crises where individuals could refer themselves or be taken by law enforcement or first responders. Patients who need inpatient psychiatric care could then be transferred to Timber Springs.

Community members and healthcare workers have testified about a need for the facilities. 

Richardson Sports and G Group, which manages properties on International Way, opposed the annexation, saying the proposed use isn’t consistent with the city’s comprehensive plan. They also are plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the city, county and PeaceHealth challenging the constitutionality of the state law.

During the work session, councilors discussed an annexation agreement between the city, PeaceHealth and Lane County, which includes a provision that the owners “will make reasonable best efforts to negotiate and maintain a Good Neighbor Agreement with neighboring property owners, to address area safety and security.”

Councilor Michelle Webber said she wanted to “reiterate how important I think it is to all of us that the neighbors are considered in this.”

“And I see head nods from PeaceHealth and partners out there, and I know that they’re taking that very seriously, and I trust that that’s the path forward that we’re all going to work toward,” she said. 

Webber said she still feels “a little bit like this is a square peg in a round hole,” but that she appreciated Councilor Kori Rodley noting at an earlier meeting that the city does not have a specific designation in its comprehensive plan for medical uses. 

“It kind of helped me get to a place where I feel more comfortable with this decision,” Webber said. “But I do still want to also make sure that we have a conversation about North Gateway and its future development plans sooner than later, because I think I’ve shared more than once my concern about one-off decisions.”

What happens next?

Alicia Beymer, chief administrative officer at PeaceHealth Sacred Heart Medical Center at RiverBend, said she was overwhelmed by the amount of support PeaceHealth has received.

“We’ve had hundreds of letters of support in this project, and then tonight to have the room filled with doctors, nurses, community members, our community partners, is just overwhelming, and I’m super-excited that we were able to receive a unanimous vote,” Beymer told Lookout Eugene-Springfield. 

“This is a critical milestone that will help us get to opening these doors in 2029,” she added. 

Beymer said PeaceHealth hopes to break ground on the hospital in late spring of 2027, with construction taking about 18 months. 

“This started decades ago when I first started working at PeaceHealth and we had children that were boarding in our emergency department and our doctors and our nurses asking, ‘Hey, how can we help these individuals so they’re not boarding in our emergency departments for weeks at a time, not getting the care that they needed,’” Beymer said. 

“And so [I] just want to thank our clinicians and our doctors for having that vision and continuing to ask for us to push this forward, and their support,” she said. “Now is our time to make a big difference for those youth and adolescents in our area.”

The Oregon Health Authority last month approved a certificate of need for the proposed behavioral hospital.

In July, Lane County commissioners approved a construction contract with Pence Contractors to build the stabilization center. 

“We’re really pleased with the decision, and we’re looking forward to moving forward with the project as quickly as possible,” Lane County Administrator Steve Mokrohisky told Lookout. “The community needs this project.”

Mokrohisky said Lane County originally looked at properties separately for the stabilization center before discovering that PeaceHealth was looking to build a new psychiatric hospital. He said forming the partnership for the campus has taken time, “but we think that it’s going to pay dividends in the long run in terms of the access to care that people will have.”

“You can’t, I don’t think, go anywhere in this community without talking to someone who has had either themselves or a family member or a friend who has needed these types of services,”  Mokrohisky said. “My family’s been affected, just like most in our community, at needing access to behavioral health crisis services and not being able to have that access, and so that’s really what this project is about.”