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Spokane County Begins Construction On Mental Health Facility

Courtesy of Spokane County

 

 

Spokane County broke ground today [Friday] on a new facility that will give police a new option for dealing with people with substance abuse and/or mental health problems.

Commissioner Al French says the current options are jail or a psychiatric facility.

“The Mental Health Crisis Stabilization Facility will allow the police officer to take this individual to treatment and that’s what this facility does. It provides not only a safe harbor, but it also provides treatment for these folks as opposed to taking them into jail," French said.

The new facility will provide the relevant services and places for them to sleep.

It will be located in a building across from the jail that, until now, has housed the county road department. French says it will provide nearly 19,000 square feet of space and cost about nine-million dollars to renovate. More than half of that, he says, will be paid by a federal grant. The county will chip in $1.5 million and the city $1.1 million.

“The police have embraced it because taking somebody to the hospital as opposed to a mental health facility saves time for the police officers. They can get back much quicker than they would be if they had to go to the hospital. Not having to take them to the jail means they don’t have a criminal record for having a mental condition," he said.

French says the new facility will be operated by Frontier Behavioral Health. It’s scheduled to open next spring.