Court rules UPMC can proceed with controversial South Hills hospital
A new UPMC hospital planned about a mile from an Allegheny Health Network hospital in Jefferson Hills can be built, a state appeals court has ruled.
The 63-bed hospital, called UPMC South, has been in the works since 2018, and is planned off Route 51 along Elliott Road.
But more than 100 Jefferson Hills residents have opposed the move.
They contend a hospital isn’t allowed on the site under the borough’s zoning ordinance, and the borough’s Zoning Hearing Board agreed.
The board revoked the zoning permit for the site in 2019 after 11 public hearings were held.
The move was upheld in August 2020 by Allegheny County Common Pleas Court Judge Joseph James.
A zoning hearing board’s interpretation of its ordinances is “entitled to great weight and deference,” James ruled.
He found the intent of the ordinance does not leave room for the development of more than one competing hospital in the same zoning district.
Commonwealth Court Judge Ellen Ceisler disagreed in an opinion filed Monday.
“The board erred by ignoring the actual wording of the zoning ordinance and by instead inferring that the proposed primary use for UPMC South… was barred by implication,” Ceisler wrote. “”The board should have limited its review to the question of whether that use was allowed by right, instead of straying further afield into broader concerns.”
She reversed Judge James’ order.
“We are please with the decision,” UPMC spokeswoman Gloria Krepps said Thursday.
She didn’t say if UPMC will move forward with plans for the hospital, aside from saying UPMC “will share updates if we have something to announce.”
RELATED: Allegheny County Court rules in favor of Jefferson Hills in UPMC case
Borough officials and the attorney for the Jefferson Hills residents did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
It is UPMC’s latest attempt to build a hospital in the South Hills. Kreps has previously said that about 700 UPMC patients who live in the Route 51 corridor travel to hospitals in the system.
In September 2017, UPMC pulled out of a deal to construct a $200 million-plus, 90-bed hospital at the Newbury Market development in South Fayette. No reason was given for dropping the South Fayette plan.
Earlier, UPMC unsuccessfully tried to build a UPMC South Center off Route 51 at Lindsay-Snyder Drive in Pleasant Hills.
Tom Davidson is a TribLive news editor. He has been a journalist in Western Pennsylvania for more than 25 years. He can be reached at tdavidson@triblive.com.
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