Helena Independent Record: Montana VA announces new $1.7M veterans care facility in Lewistown

The Veterans Health Administration awarded a contract Aug. 16 for a new $1.73 million VA outpatient clinic in Lewistown that will be the closest VA facility for more than 770 enrolled area veterans.

It will be almost double the size of the existing clinic at about 6,100 square feet. It will continue to offer primary care, dietician services, telehealth, lab services and veteran transportation service, Montana VA officials said.

The new facility will be at Lot 3, U.S. Highway 87 West. The contract was awarded to Bridgerview Development, which will build the new facility. Once complete, Montana VA will lease the new facility from the lessor for the next 20 years, officials said, adding it was part of national policy. Construction will begin after the design is completed and is expected to be finished in the spring/summer of 2026.

And it will be the Patient Aligned Care Team (PACT) model, which optimizes patient care services. The current provider is a women’s health provider. Mental health services will also be available through telehealth, they said.

“This will allow us to offer our veterans the services and care they deserve in this new, state-of-the-art, modern facility,” Duane Gill, Montana VA Health Care System’s executive director, said in a news release.

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Montana, called the new facility “a big win for veterans in Fergus County.”

Tester, chair of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, said he has been working with the VA to get this clinic for more than a year and worked with local veterans.

He said he sent a letter to VA Secretary Denis McDonough in July, where he called on him to speed up VA’s delivery of a new clinic in Lewistown and have it open as quickly as possible.

Montana VA serves over 49,000 enrolled veterans across Montana and cared for by a staff of 1,400 at 18 sites across the state.