By Will Wright

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In a show of bipartisan support for UK and improve health in Kentucky, Republican and Democratic lawmakers came together to approve funding for UK’s new $265 million research building.

The building — to be completed in spring 2018 — will stand near the UK Chandler Hospital, by the corner of Virginia and Press avenues, and will be funded half by the state and half by other sources, including private donations.

President Eli Capilouto, along with Governor Steve Beshear and legislators, said it is the state’s responsibility to promote health care at the state’s flagship university.

“We’re Kentuckians first, and Democrats and Republicans second,” Beshear said.

Robert Stivers, president of the Kentucky Senate, said though the two parties have their difficulties, politicians were able to come together around creating a healthier Kentucky.

Related: UK’s biggest donation ever will create new college, new building

Stivers said there are “so many families” that legislators have failed by allowing poor health to continue.

“We have corrected our mistakes,” Stivers said.

The 300,000 square foot building will focus on helping cure or alleviate problems with diseases that particularly affect Kentuckians like cancer, heart disease, drug abuse and diabetes, according to a press release by UK Public Relations.

The building will house researchers from a number of different fields. Health care clinicians will work side by side with people studying agriculture, engineering and people with other focuses to try and develop solutions to problems too complex for just one field.

Capilouto said the new research building will be a hub for health care in Kentucky by working in collaboration with other communities in Eastern Kentucky and elsewhere in the state that suffer from poor health.

“We’re sicker, we die earlier, we suffer more,” Beshear said. “There is a direct line between poor health and almost every problem Kentucky faces.”