When architect Russ Realmuto of Birchfield Penuel & Associates took the lead on designing a new hospital for St. Vincent’s and St. Clair County, it was more than just a professional project to him. It was personal.
“My family homesteaded the land in the 1840s. I live a mile and a half from it.” It’s home. And Realmuto calls his role in designing the new, state-of-the-art hospital “very much an honor.”
As a side note, he mentions he is due for surgery in coming weeks. “My surgery is the first scheduled in the new hospital,” he said with apparent pride, adding that he hopes others will take his lead. “It is very important that we all support the hospital now that it’s built. St. Vincent’s has such a good reputation,” but it will take a consistent community commitment to help grow the hospital.
“We feel like it is going to expand. We designed it to expand in so many different directions. It has a lot of expansion paths,” like Emergency Department treatment areas and more space for more physicians. The medical office building is built to expand.
“It is a gorgeous site.”
Realmuto is not unlike others who have worked on this project. It’s not just a hospital building to them. It’s doing something good for their hometown.
Jason Goodgame, vice president of Goodgame Company, is the project manager, who also is a Pell City native. His company joined forces with Hoar Construction, the lead contractor on the hospital, to sell it as a local Participation and Inclusion project, which meant that 25 percent of the project had to have local participation. To St. Clair County companies, that meant $6 million.
Much of the money to build the hospital came from hospital taxes of local people, and it was a way to give back, Goodgame said.
Hiring local has been the mantra of this project throughout. It is not uncommon to see names like Southern Landscapes, Joiner Plumbing or Johnny’s Electric — all St. Clair County companies — heading in and out of the site to do their work.
Nelson Glass; Kirkpatrick Concrete, which is owned by National Cement Co. in Ragland; Jenkins Brick; and Alabama Brick are just a few of the companies with ties to St. Clair County. The stained glass windows of the chapel were by Leeds Stained Glass, a Pell City-based company owned by Terry Barnes. A family business, Barnes said, it began as a church furniture endeavor that eventually led to making stained glass windows for churches and chapels all over the world.
“We are very excited” to be a part of the St. Vincent’s project, Barnes said. The hospital will be “a number-one draw for the community. You are always excited about doing something in your own community.”
For Goodgame Company, “it was important for us to be a part of it. To have our family company’s name on a building that is going to be here for the next generation is important,” Goodgame said of the 57-year-old business.
“It was a chance to be a part of something that is going to be here a long time, just like our business.”
