Adventist Health held a "topping-off" ceremony Thursday for the three-story Hanford Medical Pavilion next to the new Adventist Medical Center-Hanford at 125 Mall Drive. The ceremony celebrated the completion of the steel phase of construction. The last steel beam of the project was signed by invited guests and then lifted onto the project by a crane.

Officials at the ceremony included Rich Rawson, president and CEO of Adventist Health Central Valley Network, and Doug Lafferty, vice president of facilities development for Hanford Community Medical Center.

The "topping-off" ceremony originated in Scandinavia about 700 A.D. The modern-day ceremony is believed to have been brought to America by the Norwegian iron workers in 1898. The symbolic evergreen tree is a symbol for new growth.

The 63,000-square-foot, three-story building will feature an outpatient surgery center, an imaging center and a laboratory draw station on the ground floor and physician offices on the top two floors. Fresno-based G.L. Bruno Associates, Inc., is the developer and design-build general contractor.

The pavilion project is creating more than 100 additional construction jobs, according to Adventist Health.

(Feb. 5, 2010)