Sarasota Memorial Hospital will pursue bold expansion plans in Venice and Lakewood Ranch, following two key Sept. 22 votes by the Sarasota County Public Hospital Board.
The decision to purchase 120 acres on State Road 64 and Interstate 75 at a cost of almost $60 million for a future hospital campus will have a significant impact in the four-county area served by the Sarasota Memorial Health Care System.
That deal is contingent upon SMH working with Manatee County officials and community leaders to rezone and develop a future hospital campus.
The hospital board also approved a lease of a medical building in Venice that will lead to an expansion of oncology services in south Sarasota County.
Both moves expand on the hospital’s mission to provide services
to residents of a four-county area that, in addition to Sarasota County, includes Charlotte, DeSoto and Manatee.
Hospital officials anticipate the region to grow from about 1.2 million residents today to nearly 1.8 million over the next 25 years.
Hospital officials also anticipate Manatee County will lead that overall population growth, with a projected 9.6% increase over the next five years.
Hospital Board Chair Kevin Cooper said in a prepared statement that buying land before development accelerates is part of the board's responsibility to support the community's long-term health care needs.
“The mission of the Sarasota Memorial Health Care System is to provide healthcare services that excel in caring, quality and innovation,” Cooper said. “That focus has been central to our future planning, which is aimed at ensuring and protecting future access to world-class health care throughout our region.”
Manatee expansion follows a familiar pattern
The expansion of care offered by SMH’s Brian D. Jellison Cancer Institutein Venice also serves as an illustration of why SMH envisions a future hospital on State Road 64 in Manatee County.
Sarasota Memorial Health Care System CEO David Verinder told the Herald-Tribune that prior to the 2021 opening of the Jellison inpatient surgery and oncology tower in Sarasota, 50% of its patients were seeking advanced services outside of Sarasota County.
“We took a hard look, we saw that 50% of the people who were diagnosed with cancer in this community were choosing to leave and get their treatment elsewhere, not coming to Sarasota,” Verinder said. “We thought that was something that we could do better for the community.”
In 2025, that dropped to 30%, with the current facilities near capacity, though SMH did just open the Milman-Kover Cancer Pavilion in June.
“It’s helped the community in a dramatic way,” Verinder said.
“That’s about cancer but it’s the same story here,” he quickly added.
What is the SMH plan for Manatee County?
Verinder, who joined SMH in 2006 and became CEO in 2014, is quick to point out that Sarasota Memorial has always served as the safety net hospital for the four-county area.
When he took over SMH, there was one hospital campus that served about 18% of the population in the four-county area.
“We had all of the safety net level stuff,” Verinder said. “All the things the for-profit companies didn’t want to touch because they’re expensive and tough to do.”
Now, SMH has grown to two hospitals — with a third under construction in North Port— freestanding emergency rooms in North Port and on University Parkway in Lakewood Ranch,and several other urgent care and outpatient locations, including an urgent care that opened in Heritage Harbor, located north of State Road 64, in 2009.
That urgent care center logged 50,000 outpatient visits in 2025, noted hospital spokeswoman Kim Savage.
In 2025, Manatee County residents accounted for more than 185,000 patients, roughly 25% of SMH’s overall volume, many of whom traveled from the Lakewood Ranch area.
Earlier this year, the hospital bought a 10-acre site just east of its future hospital campus with plans to build a free-standing emergency room.
The opening of that facility and the envisioned hospital would give those residents an option — especially since Healthcare Corporation of America and BayCare Health System are both building acute care hospitals in Parrish and Orlando Health recently purchased property in Lakewood Ranch.
Subsequent phases would include development of the hospital campus as well as primary and specialty physician practices, pediatric specialty care, imaging, diagnostic and laboratory services, and other medical buildings.
“The landscape is changing,” Verinder said. “We’re looking at these companies like AdventHealth, BayCare and Orlando Health coming in and putting in a 100-bed hospital here, getting the patients in and taking them out of this community for their tertiary, quaternary care out into Orlando or Tampa.
“Our patients, our community, which is defined as a four-county area, deserve not to be shipped out,” he added.
What is the Venice expansion?
Sarasota Memorial will lease an entire 54,000-square-foot medical facility at 2695 Curry Lane in Venice that is owned by Flagship Healthcare Properties.
The three-story structure will be used for outpatient endoscopy, as a home for First Physician Group’s gastroenterologists, and for expansion of services offered by Sarasota Memorial’s Brian D. Jellison Cancer Institute.
“Cancer treatment can require frequent appointments with multiple specialists and care teams, sometimes over many months,” Kelli Dancer, vice president of the Brian D. Jellison Cancer Institute, said in a prepared statement. “Expanding these services in Venice will make it easier for patients in south Sarasota County and surrounding communities to access comprehensive, coordinated cancer care closer to where they live.
“It’s another important step in our commitment to bring the highest level of cancer care to patients throughout our region.”
Earle Kimel primarily covers local governments in Sarasota County as well as land development and environmental issues for the Herald-Tribune. Follow him on Facebook and X. He can be reached by email at earle.kimel@heraldtribune.com. Support local journalism by subscribing.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Sarasota Memorial Hospital unveils bold expansion plans
