Developer gives progress update on transforming old Redwood Area Hospital into housing

The developer working to turn the old Redwood Area Hospital into housing units gave the City of Redwood Falls an update this week on how progress is going.

David Schooff, president, broker, and owner of the Mankato-based Coldwell Banker Commercial Fisher Group, told the city council the old hospital facility “is not the easiest property to turn from a hospital into housing,” but that things are going well overall as the financial and infrastructure details are coming together.

The goal is to turn the newer part of the existing facility into 58-units of housing. Any plans for the older, original, 1950s-era hospital structure are currently on the back burner.

Schooff stated his firm is trying to keep the old hospital’s inside infrastructure — plumbing, electricity, central air — as similar as practical to what it was. He said it is, “an interesting problem, having to take apart a structure that’s so well-built, and then rebuild it to fit new conditions.”

Schooff said that building housing units these days brings in unexpected details developers in the past didn’t need to worry about much. For example, he stated mail rooms need to be made larger today to account for all the online shopping people do now. Schooff also said that his staff has tentatively designated part of the new housing facility to have a room set aside for pet-owners to take their animals in the winter.

Schooff said that if everything goes well, crews could be reworking the inside of the old hospital by as soon as this autumn. The outside of the facility is expected to stay much as it currently is.