Workers were on site this week at the project to build a new Brooks Memorial Hospital. Photo by M.J. Stafford

There was some action this week on the site of the new Brooks Memorial Hospital.

Workers tore out the foundation of the old barn that used to front the property on West Main Street in Fredonia. Giant piles of dirt adorned the area and several large construction vehicles were on the scene.

It was an apparent prelude to a massive construction project expected to start up in the fall. Project planners received two key regulatory approvals in late July to go ahead — the Fredonia Planning Board approved the site plan, and made a State Environmental Quality Review declaration of negative impact.

“I’ve been working with the hospital, trying to get them utilities for their job site trailers,” Fredonia Department of Public Works Director Scott Marsh said at a Wednesday village government meeting. “Construction’s starting there, they’re moving ahead.”

Project counsel Marc Romanowski told the Planning Board back in July, “We’re trying to beat winter where we can for concrete pours in particular.”

A berm for drainage and screening was constructed a couple months ago on one side of the site, behind some houses. The old barn was removed about the same time. However, this week’s activity is probably the most visible sign of progress yet.

It should take about 32 months to complete the $200 million, 131,000 square foot hospital, Romanowski said.

That would be the climax of a saga that has run for about a decade. Brooks-TLC, parent company of the hospital, originally planned to move it to Pomfret. Those plans fell through and Brooks-TLC changed course towards the current site, a former Cornell Cooperative Extension grape farm.

Brooks-TLC feels that New York State funding is essential to the project, and $70 million of it was announced in 2018. However, that got held up for various reasons. The COVID-19 epidemic was cited — but it turned out state planners also had serious concerns about the viability of the project.

Brooks-TLC made significant changes to the original site plan — and perhaps just as crucially, solidified its partnership with Kaleida Health. The state released the funding in 2024, and activity on a project that appeared semi-dormant for a few years ramped up again.

All of this is looked at with a “stink eye” by many in Dunkirk, the current and traditional site of Brooks Memorial Hospital. Brooks-TLC feels the current hospital on Central Avenue is too antiquated to be financially viable. However, many Dunkirk residents wanted Brooks-TLC to renovate the Central Avenue facility or build a new one elsewhere in the city.