Plans to build hospital on "bed rest"

MARBLE FALLS, Texas (KXAN) - The 22-acre property near the intersection of U.S. 281 and TX 71in Marble Falls will no longer be the site of the Lake of the Hills Regional Medical Center .

Idle construction equipment sits at the site and was supposed to be used to make the land suitable for Scott & White Healthcare to build this 100 bed hospital full-service hospital .

Developers, however, failed to improve the site with agreed upon roads, sewers and utilities.

This left the Temple-based non-profit health care organization searching for new land to build on.

" We are unhappy that we have to go look for a site," said Peter Brumleve, chief strategy officer for Scott & White, which partnered with Llano Memorial Hospital Healthcare System in April 2008 to jointly own and operate the $140 million non-profit medical complex.  "We didn't want to move."

Looking for land isn't the only problem.

The City of Marble Falls has already sunk millions into bringing water to the area.

"We are willing to put our investment on the table, but we have to have developable land to build a hospital," Brumleve explained.

Construction crews are now in the eighth phase of an eleven phase construction project to bring both water and wastewater lines south to where the hospital would have been located, but city officials said they're not worried.

Instead, they're confident the organization will still come to the area and all of the construction won't go to waste.

"Scott & White has assured us they're making every effort to relocate close to the infrastructure we have in place," said City Manager Ralph Hendricks.

The City, however, has no written agreement in place with Scott & White.

They're just taking words of commitment from organization officials at face value.

"We are going to stay as close to Highway 71 and 281 as we can," Brumleve told KXAN via phone Wednesday. "We've never wavered in our commitment to bring this project to Marble Falls."

Brumleve said talks are already underway with other potential developers in the area.

Once land it acquired and it is developed to include sewers, roads and other utilities, construction will kick off.

To view a construction timeline click on this link .