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Cherokee Health Systems, which operates the Good Samaritan Clinic and provides other medical services, is relocating to a 10,500-square-foot wing in Alcoa City Center.

Alcoa Planning Commission met in called session last week and unanimously approved the site plan.

The Alcoa Center is located on a 17-acre reservation where the Charles M. Hall High School, which opened in 1926, was formerly located. Before becoming Alcoa Center, the complex housed Alcoa Middle School.

The Charles M. Hall School football field, where black Alcoa students once competed, will serve as the parking lot for the health center. One of those students was Alcoa City Center Manager George Williams.

Also on the reservation is the state-of-the-art Rural/Metro Ambulance Service Blount headquarters and inside the renovated building are Alcoa Chiropractic Center, Lincoln Memorial University satellite campus and Blount Memorial Hospital's Joan Jackson School of Nursing, Williams said.

"You've got to have a synergy of tenants," Alcoa Center developer Walter Wise said.

Some potential tenants who were not a good fit have been steered in other directions in the city because of the type of clients wanted for the center, Williams said.

"Seven years ago we had a vision of this as a destination. A number of people we talked to couldn't see the vision in saving this old school. Over half the people who attended school in Alcoa, attended school in that building," Williams said.

The building contains the three arched columns in front that are representative of many structures built by ALCOA Inc. in its formative years. Alcoa was the stereotypical company town in its early years and this architectural element shows up again and again.

Plans are to erect three arched columns at the entrance to the health facility, said Wendy Wise Ryan, who is developing the complex along with her father, Walter Wise. Cherokee Health Systems will be located in one wing of the building. The site plan shows 112 parking stalls, four of which will be van accessible, that will be near the main entrance to the health provider.

Initially a roundabout was planned near the entrance to the building, but that has been revised into a semicircular drive where patients can be dropped off and picked up.

Julia Pearce, regional vice present of Cherokee Health Systems, said the group will be integrating the Good Samaritan Clinic and the Maryville behavioral office, which provides therapy and psychiatry. Good Samaritan Clinic offers primary care services to the underserved and uninsured.

She expects Cherokee will hire 35 on staff and have just as many volunteers. Cherokee partners with the LPN school at the Alcoa Center, Maryville College and different high schools which provide volunteers.

Cherokee professionals will offer pediatric, internal medicine and family practice. The current Cherokee facilities are located on Chantily Lane and off Grandview Drive.

Plans are for Cherokee Health Systems to open in Alcoa Center by the end of the year.