The Denver VA Hospital Blunder

The Denver VAMC has its main location adjacent to the University of Colorado Medical Center/School ... which is moving its location. Fitzsimmons Army Hospital became the location where the VA treated all the Officers... And that began becoming "generalize" in maybe the early or mid 1990s In a typical transfer of Government lands, there is usually an arrangement where the land stays within Government control or ownership, and there have been several instances where Government land was turned over to the VA system for construction of VA Medical facilities.

The word around Denver since the early 1990s was that the VA would be moving out of its current facilities and moving into the Fitzsimmons Army Hospital. So the announcement of a new VA Hospital at the Fitzsimmons location was certainly no surprise.

Now, watch the numbers carefully. In the case of Denver and Fitzsimmons -- on August 17. 1999, the Army sold 332 acres of the Fitzsimmons property to a development group (FRA - of Aurora,CO) for $1.85Million. That is about $5,573/acre and is an INCREDIBLE bang for the buck. The FRA is developing the old Fitzsimmons location into a business park, housing a very large number of medical clients. The University of Colorado Medical Center is building several buildings there.

The Denver VA Medical Center is proposing to move to Fitzsimmons and is awaiting Congressional approval for expenditures, etc. The latest report indicates the first stage New Construction will be 1,293,490 gross square feet, and will cost $350,391,000. The LAND ACQUISITION for building those facilities is budgeted at $55,000,000 ... which is almost 30 times the amount FRA paid for all of the 332 acres it bought from the Army in 1999.

Doesn't that strike you as odd? Or was it just poor money management? Maybe a failure to "look ahead?" It doesn't take much to see that it was a FINE deal for FRA and a VERY bad deal for the VA.

Apparently totally unrelated to this issue is the fact that Jim Nicholoson, a Denver lawyer and land developer, is the Bush-appointed Secretary of the Department of Veteran Affairs. He didn't come on board the VA until 2004. However, if, when he leaves that post, he goes to work for FRA or any other "land development organization" in Colorado, my BS detector will go off big time....