By OYAOL NGIRAIRIKL
Journal Staff
Construction of the Medical Arts Center in Dededo is being completed following delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the Ukraine invasion.
“We’re just doing touch ups and paving the parking lot,” said Cesar C.Cabot of CW Holdings LLC, owner of the 51,000 square foot building and the eight acres it sits on. The cost of construction is about $25 million following COVID-19 delays and price increases. Cabot is also a partner in Cabot Mantanona LLP.
CW Holdings is working with anchor tenant and neighbor Guam Regional Medical City to get GRMC moved in and hopefully completing years-long discussions with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs as a second major tenant.
“We hope to have a signed lease with the U.S. Veterans Affairs. (Discussions are) still ongoing but we’d like to think we’re very, very, very close,” Cabot told the Journal in December.
“If everything goes well, then we’re hoping for a signed contract by 2023,” Phillip Cabot said.
Tenants like the hospital and potentially the VA help fulfill Cesar Cabot’s vision for the Medical Arts Center as a “place for healing."
“It’s focused on everything health, medical and wellness,” he said, with everything in the three-story structure built to suit the needs of medical offices. “We have two full-size hospital grade elevators.”
The spaces inside the building will be up to the vendors to build out to their specifications and needs, Cabot said. And while they’re in discussions with various organizations and businesses, he said it’s health-related organizations that he wants to consider first.
“We have a lot of possible prospects who we are considering,” he said. There’s a potential skill nursing unit, senior care, and dementia care. Cabot said they’re “hoping to get more aligned with our seniors and veterans.”
He said the center is not looking to compete with Guam Memorial Hospital or GRMC. Rather, he said, it hopes to offer services that complement the work done at GMH and GRMC, and to help improve healthcare services for the elderly overall, as well as veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces.
The Medical Arts Center is adjacent to GRMC on Cabot Drive, which Cabot said is named after his father. And there are approved plans for a connecting bridge from GRMC’s second floor to the center’s third floor.
“The design is patterned after hospitals in Europe, Asia and the U.S. … you see connecting medical complexes to provide services all supporting healthcare,” Cabot said. “We’re trying to bring that to Guam. This project is our little way of elevating the level of healthcare.”
Some other potential vendors are not health related. Phillip Cabot said they include coffee shops and restaurants, which could be attractive to those working at or visiting the Medical Arts Center as well as GRMC.
GRMC is expected to move some administrative and possibly other offices to the Medical Arts Center’s second and third floors. Phillip Cabot said his understanding is this will allow GRMC more room for patients and patient-care services.
The building’s 51,000 square feet includes 45,000 square feet of usable space, which means more than 40 tenants can be accommodated, though much of that would depend on the needs of the tenant.
Phillip Cabot said the center is looking to work also with some local family doctors or clinics.
“There are a few local clinics that have been growing over the years and could be outgrowing their spots,” he said. He added the area seems to be getting very popular and people are taking notice. “We’re also getting calls from coffee shops, restaurants … who are interested in a space,” he said.
The new power plant will be built right across the Micronesia Mall. And then there’s another development across the street from the Medical Arts Center of a potential shopping center in the works.
At one point, Phillip Cabot said they thought the eight acres would have a barracks for the U.S. Marine Corps, but eventually the focus switched to health and wellness.
A groundbreaking ceremony was held April 6, 2017, for the Medical Arts Center. However, like other construction projects and businesses, development was forced to pause as SARS-CoV2 disrupted the production and transportation of goods, a situation exacerbated by the war in Ukraine.
The three-story commercial building includes the latest and environmentally friendly equipment, with eight inches of expanded polystyrene foam and three inches of foam in addition and solar panels.
The building will house medical and wellness-related services to include doctor’s offices, hospice care and senior care facilities, a pharmacy, a hemodialysis center, diagnostic and therapeutic services.
The Medical Arts Center is Phase 1 of the Latte Medical Plaza, which will comprise six buildings totaling approximately 175,000 square feet. The second phase will include the construction of an 8,000-square-foot building to house a local bank and restaurant.
Eventually, the plaza will include assisted living and nursing homes, laboratory services and other related medical and ancillary services, as well as a wellness and fitness center. mbj