Portland’s three largest public colleges have teamed up with the City to build a new education and health center for the first time.
The historic project will turn a parking lot at SW 4th Avenue and Montgomery Street into a new home for the OHSU-PSU School of Public Heath, PSU’s Graduate School of Education, Portland Community College’s dental program and a city bureau.
Ken Ma, Portland State University Director of Media Relations, says it’s a collaborate effort between Portland State, OHSU, PCC and the City of Portland. Ma says they created it with a vision of educating the next generation of public health leaders. The idea is to confront and combat underlining the challenges of health and causes of health disparity in Oregon and the Portland metro area.
The $1,000,000 building is expected to open in 2020 and marks the first time all three campuses and the city will share one space. At 200,000 square feet and up to nine stories tall, it will be one of the largest academic buildings on PSU’s main campus in downtown.
Ma says it will have a community dental clinic, will bring low-cost mental health services to the community, and will have restaurants and retail businesses on the ground floor.
Construction is expected to start sometime in 2018.