Lloyd’s legacy: 30,000-square-foot clinic to serve 38,000 people

By WILLIAM K. ALCORN

alcorn@vindy.com

WARREN

The Lloyd McCoy Jr. Health Center opens for business Monday to do what its 11-year-old namesake, killed two years ago in a drive-by shooting, was known for: helping people.

“I’m proud of my son for his accomplishments. He wanted to help people and that’s what this center is all about,” said Lloyd McCoy Sr., at the dedication Friday of One Health Ohio’s fourth health-care facility.

The Lloyd McCoy Jr. Health Center is located in southeast Warren in the former Trumbull Metropolitan Housing Authority building at 1977 Niles Road S.E.

“We’re calling this a celebration of life because of all the lives our son touched, and for the birth of this health center. We are proud and honored to have the center named after Lloyd Jr.,” said his mother, Pamela McCoy.

“He wanted to go to the NFL and take me to Hollywood. Now, this center is our Hollywood,” Pamela said.

Lloyd Jr. was about a month shy of his 12th birthday when he died April 21, 2009, the victim of retaliatory gunfire April 13 at his sister’s home on Wick Street Southeast.

He would have been 13 today.

The Lloyd McCoy Jr. center is the largest of One Health Ohio’s four health- care facilities in clinical space. It has nine medical exam rooms and seven dental operating rooms, said Dr. Ronald Dwinnells, OHO chief executive officer.

The building, which OHO is leasing from TMHA but expects to purchase this fall, has 30,000 square feet, 12,000 square feet of which has been renovated at a cost of about $1 million.

In addition to the exam rooms and dental section, Dr. Dwinnells plans to eventually rent space to a retail pharmacy and have social-services partners for mental health, speech and hearing.

The clinic targets 38,000 people, of whom 90 percent are at or below 200 percent of federal poverty-level guidelines. The target area is the southeast portion of Warren, plus Niles, Mineral Ridge, Girard and northeast portions of Youngstown, Dr. Dwinnells said.

Start-up cost for the center was about $1.5 million, including $1 million for construction and renovation.

Funding came from One Health Ohio reserves; about $890,000 from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (stimulus program), and $10,000 grants each from Dominion East Ohio and Trustmark Insurance Co.

One Health Ohio also spent about $545,000 on what Dr. Dwinnells views as a separate facility: Two vans, one for basic primary medical care, and the other for primary dental care.

The vans support the concept of active health care, going to patients rather than having them come to a clinic. The 37-foot long vans will primarily serve Warren City Schools, but will also go to other venues, Dr. Dwinnells said.

The medical van, which has two exam rooms and a central receiving area, is on site and cost about $265,000. The dental van, which will have two operatories, is being built at a cost of $280,000 and is expected to be delivered in July, he said.

Dr. Dwinnells said the health care center is not just about dollars and cents. “We wanted a health center with feelings and meaning. Lloyd Jr. inspired a lot of people. This center is about life and love and inspiration and influence. This center belongs to the community,” he said.

It’s significant that Lloyd Jr.’s name is on a T-shirt and that there is a Lloyd McCoy Jr. baseball field at Burbank Park, said Warren Mayor Michael O’Brien.

“But to say, ‘I work at Lloyd McCoy, or I went to Lloyd McCoy,’ that’s as significant as saying ‘take me to Trumbull Memorial Hospital,’” O’Brien said.

His name will go on for decades, the mayor said.