Strong Expansion Project Receives $50M in State Funding

Gov. Kathy Hochul today announced $50 million in state funding for the University of Rochester Medical Center’s Strong Memorial Hospital. The Statewide Health Care Facility Transformation Program grant will support the Strong Expansion Project, the hospital’s most comprehensive modernization in nearly 50 years.

The Strong Expansion Project will add more than 200 examination/treatment and patient observation stations in phases to the Strong ED and Comprehensive Psychiatric Emergency Program (CPEP), increasing in size from 46,000 to 175,000 square feet. Plans also include a new nine-story inpatient bed tower scheduled for completion in 2027, which will add additional ED space and floors for future operating rooms and treatment services for cardiovascular patients, along with more than 100 private inpatient rooms.

Both components of the project will help to address chronic bed shortages and ED overcrowding issues that the community has faced for years, which were further highlighted during the COVID pandemic.

“We are so appreciative of this wonderful news that the University of Rochester Medical Center and Strong Memorial Hospital are getting $50 million in a state grant designated to support expansion of emergency departments in large regional hospitals,” said Kathy Parrinello, chief operating officer of Strong Memorial.

“I just can’t thank enough Gov. Kathy Hochul for making this possible, as well as our state legislative delegation, including Assemblymember Harry Bronson, Senator Jeremy Cooney and Senator Samra Brouk,” Parrinello said. “Also, Mayor Malik Evans and County Executive Adam Bello wrote letters of support. We’re very grateful to all of them for their advocacy of this project, which will improve emergency medical care and the inpatient hospital experience for patients throughout the Finger Lakes region.”

The tower will be built west of the current hospital entrance at 601 Elmwood Ave., on a site that has housed hospital facility departments and loading docks. There will be minimal construction impacts on current patient services, entrances and parking.

Community members passing by the site on Elmwood Avenue can now see activity that will enable the new building construction to commence. A portion of the original facility, some sections dating back to 1926, is scheduled to be torn down this month to make way for the new construction.