Grand Rapids — MSU's College of Human Medicine will create a four-year medical program in west Michigan by 2010, officials announced Wednesday.

That plan is the result of nearly a year of closed-door discussions among key stakeholders in the Grand Rapids expansion — including MSU, Grand Rapids-area hospitals, the Van Andel Institute and Grand Valley State University.

"We spent a lot of time doing our homework," said David Van Andel, who acted as chairman of the stakeholders committee. "I think the stakeholders, and I can speak for all of them, are anxious to get this process started.

"The real heavy lifting now starts. We have to make all of this happen."

MSU must negotiate contracts with individual stakeholders, a process officials expect will take three to four months.

The final "proof of concept" report provides for a four-year program in Grand Rapids while maintaining the college's campus in East Lansing.

Instead of cutting back the number of students in East Lansing, the College of Human Medicine plans to admit more first-year students in the future and distribute them between the two campuses.

Initially, about 50 additional students will be admitted to the college and sent to Grand Rapids. That number will eventually grow to about 100 additional students per class, effectively doubling the size of the college.

Before any such growth could happen, it would have to be approved by a national accrediting body, but second-year students could go to Grand Rapids by 2008.

Third- and fourth-year students are already present in Grand Rapids, but first-year students would not come until 2010.

The dean will follow those students to Grand Rapids once a new building is completed to house the school.

A 2004 report compiled for the Grand Action Committee, a nonprofit organization of Grand Rapids-area leaders and a stakeholder in the process, estimated such a structure could cost up to $100 million. But Van Andel said those figures no longer apply.

MSU and Grand Action will partner to raise a significant chunk of the money, and the rest will likely be financed with a bond.

"We're going to be tapping our alums," MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon said. "We expect to have a number of alumni who live in this area who are prepared to make contributions."

MSU's development office has not been given a specific target for the fundraising, said Chuck Webb, vice president for University Development.

Like so many other details of the plan, the specifics of the structure — which would include teaching laboratories, classrooms and offices in a more than 100,000-square-foot space — and where it will be built have yet to be revealed.

One possible location for the building is on an empty lot directly adjacent to the Van Andel Institute, a cutting-edge cancer research center and driving force in the expansion.

"This medical school is going to be one focused primarily on research," Van Andel said. "It will attract students with a specific interest in research."

Part of the plan includes the creation of five research "clusters" in the Grand Rapids school. As many as 20 researchers would be involved to study cancer, obesity, cardiovascular disease, arthritis and neurobiology.

The college will maintain a single administrative structure, tuition rate and curriculum, and it will remain a part of MSU. But the Grand Rapids community will be able to claim a certain level of ownership in the school, which is to be called the MSU West Michigan Medical School.

"It will feel as if it is its own," Simon said. "That identity is important for us and important for the community."

Grand Rapids will become the focus of the college after the dean moves, Simon said. The possibility of relocation of other administrative offices is part of ongoing discussions, she added.

MSU officials say the expansion and repositioning of the college should not have a detrimental impact on Greater Lansing, and most physician faculty members in East Lansing are likely to stay put.

"There is no plan that calls for large numbers of faculty who are here to leave the community and go to Grand Rapids," said Denise Holmes, the college's assistant dean for Government Relations and Outreach, on Monday. "That exchange of people will most likely occur, but it will be individuals — it won't be large groups."