WFMZ-TV | Amy Unger
HELLERTOWN, Pa.- A shuttered Rite Aid pharmacy in Northampton County will see new life as a medical building under the umbrella of St. Luke’s University Health Network (SLUHN).
County property records show St. Luke’s paid $2.85 million for the 1.5-acre site at 110 Main St. in Hellertown. The sale was recorded earlier this month. The Rite Aid closed its doors last summer.Â
A spokesperson for SLUHN told 69 News a physician’s practice would be moving into the space but declined to provide any other details about the project, including the name of the practice.
However, Jen Peters, a senior director of real estate for the health network, appeared before Hellertown’s planning commission last November, where she talked about the project at length.
Peters said the St. Luke’s Saucon Valley Family Practice, which is currently on Front St. in the borough, would be relocated to the Rite Aid site. Also, St. Luke’s wants to open an out-patient lab there, as well as a walk-in urgent care center, which the health network brands as Care Now.Â
“We like this site, we like the way it’s configured today,” Peters told the commission, noting that no major changes were planned for the exterior, save for landscaping improvements, the addition of more parking spaces and the deletion of the pharmacy drive-thru lane, which wouldn’t be needed in the future.
The interior, though, would need to be gutted, Peters said, to convert the building into an out-patient medical facility.
Peters said the practice would have normal daytime hours with some extended evening hours for the urgent care portion.
Planners expressed support for the project and did not raise any major concerns. They voted to grant conditional approval for the site plan.Â
According to Peters, SLUHN had not yet decided what it would do with the current Saucon Valley Family Practice at 255 Front St., although it’s possible the building would be sold or leased, she said.Â