Marlborough Mayor Wants City To Challenge Mass General Facility

MARLBOROUGH, MA — Marlborough Mayor Arthur Vigeant wants to form a Ten Taxpayer Group to weigh in on plans by a Boston medical giant to build a facility nearby in Westborough.

Mass General Brigham, formerly called Partners Healthcare, is planning to build an ambulatory care facility along West Park Drive off of Route 9 near the I-495 interchange, according to the Worcester Business Journal.

Vigeant in a letter to City Council said the new facility could harm Marlborough Hospital, among other businesses.

"The site in Westborough is located within 20 minutes of 47 existing healthcare providers and could negatively impact current providers by reducing their services, revenue and employees and forcing our current providers to raise rates," Vigeant's letter to Council said. "This will impact our residents as well as Marlborough businesses."

Forming a Ten Taxpayer Group would allow Marlborough to request the state Department of Public Health hold a public hearing about the Westborough facility. Vigeant also wants an independent cost analysis to see what impact the new facility would have on existing medical care facilities, chiefly UMass Memorial-owned Marlborough Hospital.

The Mass General Brigham site in Westborough is one of three proposed in the Boston-area. The company also wants to open ambulatory centers in Woburn and Westwood.