The brand new James E. Clyburn Community Health Center sits in a familiar North Columbia neighborhood on Monticello Road, just down the road from Eau Claire High School and across the street from Capital City Church.

The $1.6 million facility will play an important role in the community as a health care center serving residents with limited access to traditional medical practices.

It was built in just 10 months after qualifying for federal funding from the Recovery Act as a “shovel-ready” project poised to spur immediate activity in construction and infrastructure. The Eau Claire Cooperative Health Centers had the project ready and waiting.

The June 3 grand opening drew a crowd from the neighborhood as well as local elected officials to hear from the center’s namesake,  long-time Democratic U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, who now serves as House Majority Whip.

Columbia Mayor Bob Coble, mayor-elect Steve Benjamin, City Councilman Sam Davis and Richland County Council Chairman Paul Livingston were on hand to greet Clyburn.

During the opening ceremony, Clyburn was recognized as a champion of “core values” and a national leader who, as majority whip, helped President Barack Obama forge the new national health care initiative.

Several speakers also made it a point to recognize Stuart Hamilton, CEO of the Eau Claire Cooperative Health Centers, who was a key player in the project.

The Eau Claire community is already familiar with the cooperative health center network, which has served the area from a variety of offices in the past, some in aged, crumbling buildings.

Livingston says the network is known by many as an avenue of choice.

“It is the first, second, third or last choice, and sometimes the only choice, for health care,” Livingston says.

He believes it is a model for the nation.

“If we could bottle up what is here and send it to Washington, it would be a solution to health care problems across the nation,” he says.

Clyburn recalled offering his own input to President Obama during a summit on the national health care initiative.

He said he gained some insight into problems with health care resources when a hospital administrator in Dillon informed him of the need to double the size of the emergency room.
Clyburn said he later learned the expansion was not needed for emergency care, but to accommodate the more than 30 percent of emergency room patients who are actually seeking primary care but have nowhere else to go.

He advised the president that a national health plan should “get people out of emergency rooms” when their needs could be addressed elsewhere.

The new national health care measure will provide $11 billion for community health care costs, Clyburn says.

“It will double the capacity we now have,” he says.

Hamilton suggests some divine intervention must have helped with the unlikely prospect that the new community treatment facility is now provided “with no mortgage.”

But he also credits Clyburn and his advocacy for the underprivileged.

The new facility will provide comprehensive pediatric care, internal medicine and pharmacy services to many who have difficulty finding access to such services.

Eau Claire Internal Medicine, the Sterling Sharpe Pediatric Center and Cooperative Health Pharmacy are merged in the new center.

Eau Claire Pediatrics, established in 1981 by Hamilton, became a nonprofit corporation, Eau Claire Cooperative Health Centers, Inc., in 1993 with the creation of the Sterling Sharpe Pediatric Center and Eau Claire Internal and Behavioral Medicine. The center achieved status as a federally qualified health center in 2000.

The operation eventually grew far beyond its Eau Claire roots, expanding into four counties.

Facilities now include Waverly Women’s Health, Waverly Family Practice, Brookland-Cayce Medical Practice, Brookland Community Pediatrics, Five Points Pediatrics, Pediatrics of Batesburg-Leesville, Women’s Health and Internal Medicine of Batesburg-Leesville, Pediatrics of Newberry, Ridgeway Family Practice, Cooperative Family Dentistry and Cooperative Health Pharmacy.

The combined facilities serve over 50,000 active patients with more than 128,000 patient visits every year.

Clyburn was in North Columbia for another ribbon-cutting just three weeks earlier when a North Main streetscaping project was completed.

The first phase of the project cost about $13 million. Subsequent phases will cost around $11 million. That money will also come from federal stimulus dollars that Clyburn helped direct to Columbia.

Clyburn’s ability to direct federal dollars to his home state continues to enhance his electability. He will have Republican opposition in November but is considered a heavy favorite with strong support in his district and a hefty campaign war chest.