Santa Barbara Neighborhood Clinics

It’s an indicator of change. Those chain link fences lined with black plastic are popping up in nascent construction sites all over town – augmented with copious dirt piles and hovered over by towering cranes. Near the end of May, one such scene appeared near the high-traffic intersection of Micheltorena and San Andres streets on Santa Barbara’s Westside. It’s probably the most exciting project to hit the area in a very long time, as the new building will house Santa Barbara Neighborhood Clinics’ (SBNC) vastly upgraded Westside campus. 

The new state-of-the-art integrated care facility will provide comprehensive medical, behavioral health and dental care under one roof for the first time at the location, which will be able to serve up to 8,300 children, adults, and seniors each year. The new expansive clinic covers three floors totaling more than 19,000 square feet, encompassing eight medical examination rooms, six dental stations (twice as many as at the Eastside location), two dedicated behavioral health spaces, health promotion offices, labs, and even a dedicated community education center. When the new clinic site is completed, the current Westside Clinic across the street will be converted to SBNC’s specialty center for podiatry, acupuncture, and chiropractic services; meaning residents in that part of town will have easy access to just about everything offered by SBNC. 

“It’s a milestone moment. We have been trying to build this new campus since 2017,” said Mahdi Ashrafian, CEO of the Santa Barbara Neighborhood Clinics. “We are here for the uninsured, underinsured, and underserved people in the community to get the health care that they need close to home. It’s been a big issue on the Westside and our current clinic is really small, an old house that was converted into a clinic.”

The new space will go a long way toward improving Santa Barbara Neighborhood Clinics’ ability to provide comprehensive healthcare, regardless of a patient’s ability to pay, and in an environment that fosters respect, compassion and dignity. SBNC has long occupied the role of Santa Barbara’s veritable medical safety net, one that is combatting the sobering statistic that nearly one in four Santa Barbara residents do not have access to primary healthcare. More than 80% of SBNC’s patients are considered low income, including nearly 20% who are entirely uninsured. 

The upgraded clinic will double or even triple the capacity for the number of patients served and total visits every year. 

“It’s why we are here,” Ashrafian said. “When our neighbors cannot get the health care they need when they need it, many have to rely on emergency services or simply go without, leading to worse outcomes. This is health equity in action.” 

SBNC has been moving toward building the new Westside campus since 2017, but early fundraising efforts proved insufficient in the wake of the pandemic, when costs skyrocketed and architectural requirements changed. This new Westside clinic will serve as SBNC’s flagship in a network that includes medical and dental clinics on the Eastside and in Goleta, the Isla Vista Neighborhood Clinic, a Bridge Clinic downtown for substance use disorders, and three mobile clinics that principally serve children whose parents aren’t able to bring them onsite. 

So the nonprofit launched a new comprehensive campaign with a total goal of $26 million, broken down into three sections, including completing construction on the Westside at $12 million. Nine million dollars goes toward covering the SBNC’s annual $3 million operating deficit for three years. And $5 million is earmarked for the medical data sharing platform known as Epic, more familiarly known as MyChart. 

If the latter ask seems like a huge expense in comparison to bricks and mortar, the dollars are dwarfed by the value-add for SBNC’s patients. As anyone who has a non-MyChart doctor knows, communicating with Sansum/Sutter Health or Cottage Health without it can be a nightmare. 

“It’s a huge need, just huge,” Ashrafian said. “Our patients will be affected in so many wonderful ways. Rather than us having to print out charts on paper to refer someone to a specialist, which leaves a lot of room for error, it all happens electronically, which means more efficiency and accuracy. But patients also can get much more engaged in their own care, as you are able to look at your lab results, message your providers, make or cancel your own appointments, and look at your visit notes. We cannot offer that to our patients right now. It will be a massive difference.” 

Construction on the new Westside Clinic is slated to be completed by September 2026, but you don’t have to wait until then to see what it will look like, or try to peer through openings at the construction site to check on the progress. 

SBNC has a live stream of the project site running 24 hours a day on its website, where one can also find a virtual tour of the new facility, conducted and narrated by Ashrafian. 

“You can see how that neighborhood is going to look, how the clinic will be organized, all three stories, and all of the services,” he said. “I think it’s really going to change the neighborhood. And we’re going to be hiring a lot more people from the neighborhood to work there, which makes that area safer and healthier and economically stronger and more successful.”

With the changing political climate, Ashrafian said SBNC stands ready to meet whatever needs arise. 

“We continue to see everyone,” he said. “We are unwavering in our commitment to our patients and to the community. They are the reason why we exist.”

The CEO also wanted to point out that while most folks in Montecito probably aren’t patients of SBNC, they almost assuredly associate with people who do use the clinics’ services. 

“People who work in their houses or help them in other ways are our patients. The ones who work in restaurants, construction, and hospitality use our services. And rarely does even a week go by without me seeing someone who tells me that while they’re successful now, once upon a time, maybe during college or when they didn’t have insurance, they came to the Westside Clinic. We are here for everyone.”

Visit www.sbclinics.org for more information