Officials gather in Southwest Fresno on Friday, Oct. 24, to cut the ribbon for the new United Health Centers facility. Photo by Ben Hensley
published on October 24, 2025 – 2:33 PM
Written by Ben Hensley
United Health Centers (UHC) celebrated the opening of its 39th health center on Friday, Oct. 24, with the ribbon cutting of the Fresno Cesar Chavez Health Center.
The center, located at 122 E. Cesar Chavez Blvd, near Edison High School, includes 13,050-square-feet of space dedicated for medical and dental services, behavioral health and chiropractic care and women’s health, as well as x-ray and lab services.
United Health Centers officials said the new location — slated to cost $25 million-$30 million to build — will help to bridge the gap in health care suffered by residents in the area and its surrounding zip codes, 93706, 93701 and 93721.
“Health care is a right for everyone, no matter what walk of life you come from, how much money you make or you don’t make, and we’re going to do our very best and our part to improve the community,” said Justin Preas, UHC president and CEO. “If people don’t have access to quality health care, so many other things in life are not possible.”
Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer spoke at the ceremony, commenting on the importance of health coverage in Southwest Fresno. He said there is an added element to ceremonies that present the opportunity to better the core health of a community.
“One thing that we learned during the pandemic: we were exposed in Fresno,” Dyer said. “We were exposed to the tremendous need that we had in certain parts of our city for medical care.”
Fresno City Councilmember Miguel Arias said that the opening is an example of how the council has worked to support low-income residents.
“As a result of that advocacy we now have a $100 million college campus around the corner — the Fresno City College West Fresno Campus,” he said. “We now find ourselves finishing up the construction of a ten-acre park around the corner.”
That advocacy, Arias said, also led the city to take an “unprecedented” investment to $6 million to UHC to open its Cesar Chavez location.
“As a city we would say our job is police, fire, roads and parks — health care is not our lane,” Arias said. “But in the pandemic, it forced all of us to look differently at what our lane was.”
Next month, UHC will open its 40th location at 3652 W. Shields Ave.