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Centre County to seek $3.5M in grants to add crisis residential center, enhance mobile services

Centre Daily Times - 7/6/2021

Jul. 7—With mental health services under scrutiny for the past several years, Centre County plans to apply for $3.85 million in grants to create a crisis residential and evaluation site and expand its mobile crisis intervention services.

The county previously submitted two letters of intent to the Community and Mental Health Services Block Grant through the Office of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services in early May, when the grant funding opportunity was initially announced, Natalie Corman, Centre County Human Services administrator said during Tuesday's Centre County Commissioners meeting. The grants are primarily for enhancing crisis services. Since then, the county was granted the opportunity to fully apply for $3.85 million in funding, which they intend to do this week.

Crisis services have been an ongoing discussion in the community for years, but in particular the last two years, Corman said. The grants could help tackle that.

The first application is for $850,000. That will provide the expansion and enhancement of mobile crisis intervention services provided by Center for Community Resources, the walk-in assessment center that opened in late 2019, Corman said.

"So what that means is, having an individual who is ready to respond to the community as needed, whether that's a request from law enforcement, whether that's a request from an individual themselves, or school districts, whether it's the emergency department, whatever the case might be," Corman said.

Enhancing the staffing level will ensure a quick response time, she said.

The funding would allow for seven full-time mobile crisis workers to be hired by the end of the calendar year and three certified peer specialists to be available for crisis calls.

"That's unique to us, it's not a service that we provided before, but we really see the need to promote peer services, especially for people in crisis, often for the first time they're in crisis," she said. While this isn't a co-responder service, Corman said they see it as a partnership with law enforcement.

The second, larger grant application will be for $3 million to create a crisis residential and evaluation site. Corman said the county previously requested bids for a crisis residential service and the walk-in center, but did not receive any bids for the residential services.

But the need is still there.

"We never really let go of that dream to have a residential service and a respite service in our community, and what we've really seen over the last year, 18 months, has been our residential program ... be used more as a short-term residential for individuals," Corman said. Often it's a diversion to a state hospital or another facility, she said.

At the crisis residential and evaluation site, evaluations would be done on-site through a partnership with Oasis LifeCare. That will be similar to the walk-in center, but will be more enhanced, Corman said. Short-term stays (one to seven days) can be accommodated there, as well as one bed will be available for a longer, more transitional stay.

"So this is really Community Service Group, Center for Community Resources and Oasis LifeCare all coming together as partners and saying, 'We think we can each do our piece of this puzzle to enhance it,'" Corman said.

Corman said as long as the application meets all the financial budget and program explanations, the county is likely to receive the funding for the next two years.

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