THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, February 16, 1996 TAG: 9602140130
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Ida Kay's Portsmouth
SOURCE: Ida Kay Jordan
LENGTH: Medium: 92 lines
The relationship between the Naval Hospital and Portsmouth continues to warm.
Last week, when the hospital received the Meritorious Unit Commendation, the ceremony in the hospital auditorium was attended by a number of townspeople.
Mayor Gloria O. Webb and Museums Director Betty Burnell went over to judge an art show by hospital personnel that opened the same day.
``For a long time, we never heard from this place,'' Webb said. ``Then two C.O.'s (commanding officers) ago, we seemed to get together more.''
Lo and behold, there they were, judging the art show.
The hospital received the award for ``unparalleled success in overcoming the numerous challenges of providing state-of-the-art medical care during reductions in funding and manpower.''
The award was presented by Rear Adm. Robert S. Cole, commander of the Norfolk Naval Base, to Rear Adm. William R. Rowley, commander of the medical center.
Both admirals enthusiastically praised the 4,500 people who run the Portsmouth hospital.
Rowley said the award was earned mostly during Rear Adm. Bill McDaniel's years as the commanding officer.
``It's the largest staff the hospital has ever had, and it's the best,'' Rowley said. ``It's the busiest hospital in the Navy and the most cost-efficient in the entire military.''
He said that the work is done in ``old space with limited equipment.''
``The hospital is bulging at the seams,'' he said. ``This building (the high rise) is 35 years old, and Building 1 was 35 years old in the Civil War.''
Of course, all of that is going to change in the next few years. A $330 million construction project is scheduled for completion no later than the fall of 1997.
The new million-square-foot hospital will contain five floors. The third and fourth floors will house inpatient facilities with 363 beds, and the fifth floor will be used for a psychiatry section. Outpatients, about 800,000 a year, will be treated on the first two floors.
The construction of the new hospital facility, which is expected to bring hundreds of additional Navy personnel to the city, has created a lot of excitement.
Navy personnel worked out details for the major construction project with the city and the nearby neighborhood, a move that brought local people and Navy folks closer together.
The hospital grounds, once open and used by local folks as a park, long have been fenced off. However, the end of the cold war and the loosening of restrictions has eased a tension that once seemed to exist between the town and hospital. In fact, the new hospital was designed to leave the original hospital building as a historic site and to save the ancient trees and open space on Hospital Point as a park.
In addition, the designers of the project really kept Portsmouth in mind. They ordered wrought iron and brick fencing around the grounds in Park View, replacing ugly chain link that had been a scar on the community for many years.
Rear Adm. Bill McDaniel, predecessor to Rowley, was a friendly, outgoing person who took great pleasure in paddling his canoe around Crawford Bay. Rowley has been very involved in the community and even spent a morning on a city-planned bus tour to show Navy housing specialists some of Portsmouth's residential areas.
Last week at the awards ceremony, Rowley introduced the mayor to the audience. I looked around and spied a few more locals, including Lonny Saylor, executive director of the Portsmouth office of the Chamber of Commerce, and a group of Chamber members.
Two former Naval Shipyard commanders, Rear Adm. James A. ``Moose'' Brown and Rear Adm. Jamie Adair, along with their wives, also attended the ceremony. Both couples are retired in Portsmouth.
All of them attended a reception on the first floor, where the art show was open. All the art was done by military personnel at the hospital or their spouses. The art show is open to the public.
Generally speaking, the hospital and the community seem to be getting closer together.
That could be good for everybody.
In the first place, hospital personnel could save a lot of energy by living in Portsmouth rather than doing long commutes after working long hours. In the second place, Portsmouth would like to have more hospital folks living in the city and spending their money in town.
But that's not going to happen unless the people at the hospital find out that Portsmouth is a nice, safe and convenient place to live. And that's not going to happen until they get to know more people in the community.
That's why the increasing interaction between the military and civilians is important. by CNB