TRR photo by David Hulse Members of the Emerald Corporate Center board, the Sullivan County Legislature, Rep. Maurice Hinchey, State Senator John Bonacic and Crystal Run Healthcare Managing Partner Dr. Hal Teitelbaum are pictured at the August 19 groundbreaking for Crystal Run’s new $20 million facility in Rock Hill. (Click for larger image)

Crystal Run ground breaking is a homecoming

By DAVID HULSE

ROCK HILL, NY — The kid from the Monticello Bagel Bakery came back home in style on Tuesday. Managing Partner, Dr. Hal Teitelbaum helped break ground for the new $20 million, 81,000 square foot Crystal Run Healthcare facility at Sullivan County’s Emerald Corporate Center.

Teitelbaum said it has always been his dream to return to Sullivan County ever since his family sold the bakery in 1962, but one thing or another has kept him elsewhere. On Tuesday he said, “I have returned and I will not let you down.

Getting back for Teitelbaum has all been a matter of looking at what people said couldn’t be done and then doing it.

First it was changing the direction for health care that had seen physicians less and less involved in making health care decisions and creating a pro-active partnership of physicians who made their own decisions.

Then there was Orange County, where he expanded a two-person 1994 medical practice to 80 physicians in nine years.

	TRR photo by David Hulse Dr. Hal Teitelbaum (Click for larger image)

Like the 72,000 square-foot outpatient medical facility he built in the Town of Wallkill.

Like getting the permits to build a bigger structure in Sullivan County in a matter of six months.

“They said it couldn’t be done,” he said.

The final decision to move into Sullivan in big way was not sentimental. It was practical. “We found many of our patients were from Sullivan County and everything here: the corporate center, the [state] Empire Zone, the permitting, just came together,” he said.

There were credits given to dozens involved in the project, but Sullivan County Planning Commission Alan Sorensen, who was instrumental in creating the corporate center, credited state Senator John Bonacic for writing the legislation that brought the state economic incentive zone to Sullivan County and Sullivan County Partnership President Michael Sullivan with convincing Teitelbaum about the project.

The Crystal Run Healthcare facility, which will combine outpatient care and corporate offices, will employ 300 people and is expected to be completed next year.

Corporate center board chair and County Manager Dan Briggs said the Crystal Run project was a great start for the center and provided great new diversification for Sullivan County’s economy.

“We’ve got a lot of interest in the remaining sites. More interest than we have lots,” Briggs said.