Florida Reps Want Lake Baldwin VA Clinic to Stay Open

We needed a new hospital considering Lake Baldwin, while huge, is just a clinic. We're getting a new one, (Lord only knows when it will open) but it should be used with the clinic considering how many veterans are in Central Florida. Lawmakers are pushing to keep it open and so are veterans.

Mica: Keep VA clinic open
Orlando Sentinel
April 14, 2014

U.S. Rep. John Mica, with support from other Central Florida congressmen, is pushing to keep open the Veterans Affairs clinic and two veterans housing centers on Lake Baldwin, even though those services are being moved to the new Veterans Affairs hospital in Lake Nona.

On Monday, Mica sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs urging the department to keep the Lake Baldwin facilities open to serve the increasing number of veterans needing health care. The letter also was signed by U.S. Reps. Daniel Webster, R-Winter Garden; Alan Grayson, D-Orlando; and Corrine Brown, D-Jacksonville.

Besides the Lake Baldwin Outpatient Clinic, which has served an average of 96,000 veterans a year with virtually all medical services except in-patient hospitalization, the Lake Baldwin campus includes a 120-bed nursing center and a 60-bed domiciliary, which provided residential services to homeless veterans.

"We want action," Mica said. "We will get it."

Mica is a Winter Park Republican whose district includes the Lake Baldwin area.

The new 134-bed Orlando VA Hospital, part of a $665 million, million-square-foot Veterans Affairs complex at Lake Nona, is set to be completed late this year and likely will open next spring. Portions of the complex already have opened, and services are being transferred from Lake Baldwin.

The Lake Baldwin VA complex has about 400,000 square feet and costs about $8 million a year to operate, said Mike Strickler, spokesman for the Orlando VA Medical Center.
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