Coeur D’Alene, located in Northern Idaho, was an economically distressed community suffering from a shortage of primary care physicians, a poverty rate of nearly 36 percent, and a median income of only 48 percent of the state’s median income.

Since 1966, the Kootenai Medical Center had been providing medical services to low-income residents in the region, but with limited access to capital, the center had not been able to modernize or expand. In 2012, to help residents of Northern Idaho gain better access to health care, as well as to increase job creation, Montana CDC, a Community Development Entity based in Missoula, Montana, provided $11.3 million in NMTC financing to support an expansion project of the Kootenai Medical Center in Coeur D’Alene.

Completed in October 2013, the expansion project includes the construction of a new office building just north of the main building. This new 57,702 sq. ft. facility allows Kootenai Health to consolidate its business services operations, some of which were previously housed at off-site locations, and create space in the main hospital building for the expansion of KMC’s radiology, infusion therapy, and outpatient treatment services.

The expansion also accommodated the Kootenai Health Primary Care Medical Residency Program, which provides graduate medical education for 18 residents a year. Over 50 percent of the residency graduates remain in the community to start new practices. According to the American Association of Family Physicians, each of these new practices creates an average of $1.3 million of economic impact and another 6-7 new jobs.

Kootenai Health also located its diabetes, endocrinology, and neurology centers in the building, in addition to its support services, including a lab, basic radiology, and financial consulting. In all, 75 to 100 people are employed in the new building.

“This effort to expand much-needed primary health care capacity while creating jobs is a win-win for North Idaho,” said U.S. Senator Mike Crapo of Idaho.