The main brick building of the former St. Joseph’s Hospital near downtown St. Paul is likely to be torn down, with the St. Paul Port Authority moving to buy the site for $1, and borrow $6 million for demolition.
The authority’s board is expected to vote Tuesday on the plan to tear down the hospital building, built in 1960, and prepare the 5-acre site near the Xcel Energy Center for future development.
The hospital, behind the Dorothy Day Center on Exchange Street and St. Peter Street, has been vacant for more than three years.
St. Joseph’s was Minnesota’s first hospital, founded in 1853. The current hospital building opened in 1960.
The original May 3, 1958 caption reads: Ground was broken in ceremonies Saturday for a new six-million-dollar addition to St. Joseph’s hospital, St. Paul. The new unit, to be called the John Gregory Murray unit after the late archbishop of St. Paul, will give the 105-year-old hospital a total of 450 beds. The Most Rev. Leonard P. Cowley, auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese of St. Paul, spoke to the crowd (see photo) gathered for the occasion. The hospital is operated by the Sisters of St. Joseph. It is the oldest hospital in the state, and is five years older than the state of Minnesota. The project is part of the St. Paul downtown redevelopment program.
Before it closed, St. Joseph’s housed an emergency room and provided 105 beds for psychiatric care, but Fairview announced plans to close those beds in 2019, just two years after acquiring the hospital in a merger, and three years after the hospital stopped delivering babies.
The closure had been slated for 2020, but COVID-19 kept the hospital’s emergency room open through early 2022.
Since the hospital closed, the Port Authority has been working with Fairview to try to find a buyer for the 5.5-acre hospital site since 2020, according to meeting materials.
Potential buyers have balked at the cost to demolish the hospital building and sever two skyway links to nearby buildings, including the newer glass-fronted building north of 10th Street.
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