DOWAGIAC — The Dowagiac Rotary Club learned more about a local healthcare provider Thursday afternoon.

Rose Middleton Willson, marketing and development coordinator for the Cassopolis Family Clinic Network, presented Thursday at the Dowagiac Rotary Club’s regular weekly meeting. Her presentation focused on the what CFCN is, the services it provides and what services will be provided at a new CFCN location in Niles.

“We are an independent, Federally Qualified Health Center,” Willson said. “That’s a fancy way of saying we take care of everyone — insurance or no insurance, Medicaid, Medicare. Anyone that walks through our doors, we will take care of them. … It’s open to everyone, regardless of whether or not they are able to pay.”

The network currently has five locations in Niles and Cassopolis:

• The Cassopolis Family Clinic, 261 M-62 N., Cassopolis

• Niles Community Health Center, 24 N. St. Joseph Ave., Niles

• Niles Community Health Center Dental, 122 Grant St., Niles

• Obstetrics and Gynecology, 60 N. St. Joseph Ave., Niles

• Ranger Wellness Center, 22721 Diamond Cove St., Cassopolis

Between the five locations, CFCN serves more than 13,000 patients annually.

CFCN offers primary care, obstetrics and gynecology, dental, behavioral health, pharmacy and health care enrollment assistance, Willson said.

The most recent news Willson presented to the Rotary Club Thursday was that CFCN is currently working on a new facility for the Niles Community Health Center. The project, which broke ground in September, will result in a 31,500-square-foot facility that will include 26 exam rooms and a drive-through pharmacy for patients. Behavioral health services will also be available at the new facility and will include psychiatry and substance abuse treatment.

The project was necessary as the current facility serves more than 3,000 patients annually, despite the fact that the space was meant to care for a fraction of that number, Willson said.

“We are building a new state of the art facility that will be roughly the same size of what we have in Cassopolis,” she said. “We will really be meeting the need and growing here.”

With big changes on the horizon, Willson said she is excited and that she hopes the Dowagiac community will become excited as well. Though CFCN does not have any physical spaces in Dowagiac, Willson said that the network serves 1,387 patients from within the Dowagiac area code each year.

“I know growing up here, we would think of Cass as Cass, Dowagiac as Dowagiac and Niles as Niles,” Willson said. “We didn’t always bring those communities together. But now, as I have grown up, I’ve noticed that it is one community. We really are one community. … [CFCN] serves the whole community.”