In June 2025, Michigan Medicine opened the doors of the Ypsilanti Health Center at 300 W. Michigan Ave. with a mission that was twofold: to improve health outcomes and the social determinants of health in a city that has long trailed Ann Arbor in both.
The $35 million health center, located in the Michigan Innovation Headquarters (Mi-HQ) building, is triple the size of its former location on Arnet St. and serves 20,000 patients a year for primary and specialty care, advanced imaging, mental health treatment, and wraparound services including a community food pantry. Leaders at Michigan Medicine had hoped its presence downtown would also contribute to the economic revitalization of the city.
“We knew we wanted to contribute to the community in very tangible ways,” emails Ebony Parker-Featherstone, medical director of the center. “This includes things like job creation, economic impact, proximity to the public library, and community partnerships.”
Studies show that poverty and social instability are contributing factors to behavioral health issues and chronic diseases such as high blood pressure and heart disease. By strengthening Ypsilanti’s economy, the center could help improve what are known as the social determinants of health.
There’s no question the center has expanded access to healthcare in an underserved community. But a year into its operation, the center’s economic impact remains harder to measure.
Ypsi is known for its eclectic mix of independently owned shops, ranging from vintage collectibles and herbal remedies to mini-golf and southern barbecue. During the summer of 2025, a Mi-HQ staffer visited businesses along W. Michigan Ave. to get them excited about an imminent increase in sales that would be driven by the hundreds of employees working in the building. But none of the seven business owners interviewed for this story reported a significant increase in sales since then, and two local real estate agents say there is no sign yet that new workers from the center are choosing to make Ypsi home.
Sierra Lambert, owner of Bridge Community Café just down the block from the Ypsilanti Health Center, says she has seen at most a 5 percent increase in sales. “When they were planning to open, I think they thought the impact would be a lot bigger than what it was,” she says, “and so I think it got overhyped, which made the impact feel smaller.”
Carlos Franklin, co-owner of Black Stone Bookstore, says he’s glad the center has moved to his part of town and is serving the community’s health care needs, but few new customers have walked through his door. Dexter, Saline, Plymouth, and Ann Arbor have “a lot of vibrant anchor stores,” he notes, whereas downtown Ypsilanti is full of small specialty shops like his. “You can’t go take $1,000 and say, ‘I’m gonna go downtown and come back broke,’ because there’s nothing to buy, nothing to do.”
The institutions behind the center say they’re still committed to sparking new growth in the neighborhood. Mark Smith is president of Mi-HQ, the Ann Arbor–based coworking company and business incubator that purchased the 130,000-square-foot building in 2022 to serve as a life science and technology hub. Smith says when the building is fully occupied, it will host around 500 workers.
“Mi-HQ’s mission is to help build companies that’ll put down roots in the community,” he explains. The building is located within a federally designated Opportunity Zone, a program designed to encourage private investment in economically distressed communities.
Mark Smith, president of Mi-HQ, says his group is working with other partners on projects to attract more foot traffic to downtown businesses. | Doug Coombe (Courtesy Mi-HQ)
For Smith and others invested in the corridor, the Health Center is just one piece of a long-term strategy that includes housing, streetscape improvements, and attracting new employers.
Still, Smith recognizes that the center hasn’t had much of an impact on the downtown economy. Even though the companies in the building are locally owned, he says, few of their employees are frequenting downtown businesses. “I hope that we can change that as we start to fill out the other spaces with other companies, and they become more ingrained in the community,” he says.
One hurdle, he says, is the building’s design. The back entrance is connected to a large parking structure and is strategically located adjacent to the Ypsilanti Transit Center, making it easier for patients to access care and for employees to get to work. But this accessibility has drawbacks for local businesses. “People are challenged to go out the front door and go down the street,” he says. “They’re coming there for a single purpose and they’re getting back in their cars and going away.”
Smith is actively partnering with Ypsilanti City Council, Ann Arbor Spark, EMU, and other groups to bring “more feet on the street and more bodies downtown,” he says. “So our next phase will be some workforce housing,” in addition to market-rate housing to attract “people who have got some disposable income, not just to eat and drink down there, but to frequent the businesses.”
Mi-HQ is already moving this vision forward with 301 W. Michigan Ave., directly across the street. Smith says the four-story, black-glass building, which they purchased in 2024, is already “mostly filled up” with new tenants that include a mix of larger businesses, first-floor retail, and market-rate residential apartments. Mi-HQ does not yet have a start date for construction of workforce housing on the building’s parking lot. Parking will be moved to a new underground lot. “I’m hopeful that a lot of the people that are working for Michigan Medicine will be able to live close by,” Smith says.
Mi-HQ is also working to bring some of the charm of Ypsi’s residential side streets to Michigan Ave. “We’ve put together a proposal, a plan for beautification along the Michigan Ave. corridor from Hamilton down to Water St.,” he says.