Viable Dempsey

This newspaper has persistently backed proposals to renovate Dempsey Hospital at the University of Connecticut Health Center in Farmington. Expanding and improving the hospital is critical to the goal of making the UConn School of Medicine a top-tier program. An improved health center will attract more research grants and ancillary businesses and will create well-paying jobs.

That is why we welcome plans announced Tuesday by Gov. M. Jodi Rell to invest $352 million to renovate and expand Dempsey and fund collaborative programs with other hospitals in the region.

The new plan includes $236 million for a new patient tower at Dempsey and $96 million to renovate academic research space at the health center campus. Another $20 million would support initiatives with neighboring hospitals. Called the UConn Health Network, it would include Hartford Hospital, Saint Francis Hospital, Connecticut Children's Medical Center and the UConn Health Center.

Including other hospitals is vital. Fear of competition helped undercut earlier revitalization plans, among them creation of a two-campus "University Hospital" with Hartford Hospital and UConn as partners.

Gov. Rell said the new project would generate 5,000 health care jobs by expanding the Primary Care Institute at Saint Francis, develop a diagnostic equipment simulation center at Hartford Hospital and create a neonatal care program administered by the Children's Medical Center.

The improved health center would set the goal of becoming a federally designated Comprehensive Cancer Center, the second in the state, Yale being the other. Also planned is a new institute to attract and manage clinical drug trials.

Funding will be a challenge, but manageable - $227 million in state bonding, which the governor said will come from canceling other projects and $25 million already set aside for design and planning. U.S. Sen. Christopher J. Dodd included the rest, $100 million, in the Senate health care bill, which Democrats are trying to pass over Republican opposition.

This is a plan well worth pursuing.