A $253 million nursing home and outpatient clinic for veterans will get built in San Joaquin County by 2015 at the earliest, federal officials said today.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has long debated whether to place the regional medical center in Stanislaus or San Joaquin counties, while each county vied for it. The department announced its decision today to choose San Joaquin County.

Officials have yet to decide where in the county to build the center and 120-bed nursing home, but lawmakers and various veterans rights advocates have for several years pushed for an eight-acre site next to San Joaquin County General Hospital in French Camp, which already has an outpatient clinic for veterans.

The clinic and nursing home would likely get built around 2015, according to Kerri Childress, spokeswoman for the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System.

It would offer services such as radiology, pharmacy, dental care, optometry, audiology and physical therapy for former military men and women, she said. And it should create about 900 new jobs, said Congressman Jerry McNerney, D-Pleasanton.

But before the new center gets built, the department plans to double in size the two outpatient clinics for veterans in Modesto and Stockton from 10,000 square feet to 20,000 square feet by next year. Remodeling should start this summer, Childress said.

“It’s all part of a plan to build clinics where more veterans can access them,” Childress said.

Many veterans move to the Central Valley because it’s affordable, she said. Right now, 42,000 call San Joaquin County home. About 700 are members of veterans groups in Tracy, a town with a high number of Iraq war deaths per capita nationwide.

And with a new generation of veterans, Childress said it’s important for the government to brace for the influx of those who need public medical treatment.

With the Livermore Veterans Affairs Medical Center slated to close in 2012, Childress said the department is trying to move those services elsewhere to both the Central Valley and the East Bay. A site in San Joaquin County makes sense, she said, because it’s close to several major freeways and home a large number of veterans.

The Livermore clinic was originally a sanitarium, built more than 100 years ago. So it’s isolated, on top of a hill and hard to access by public transportation.

John Treantos, president of the Tracy War Memorial Association and the local American Legion post, said he’s fought for years to have a Central Valley clinic for veterans.

“It’ something we’ve wanted here for a very long time,” he said. “It’s encouraging to see the support we got. It’s encouraging to see the progress we’ve made.”

In January, lawmakers and activists rallied outside the public hospital in French Camp to demonstrate their support for the site. Even with the federal decision today to build the center in San Joaquin County, Childress said planners will look at several sites in the county in addition to the one in French Camp.

•Contact Tracy Press reporter Jennifer Wadsworth at 830-4225 or jwadsworth@tracypress.com.