As part of the county’s overhaul of its mental health system, the Milwaukee County Behavioral Health Division plans to open a $1.2 million wraparound service center on the city’s north side by the end of 2016.
BHD leaders are working with the county to obtain an additional $1.2 million for a second facility on the south side that would open by the end of 2017.
The facilities will house nonprofits, a county mental health crisis team, psychiatrists, a private health care provider and counselors for people experiencing mental health problems.
“This is a new front door to be able to access services,” said Amy Lorenz, deputy administrator of community access to recovery services for BHD. “One of our biggest goals with creating these centers is to have our behavioral health and drug abuse services more centrally located.”
Lorenz said BHD representatives have not yet begun scouting locations. The county is still talking with potential partners to determine how much space they will need.
New construction is off the table, she said. Instead, the county will be searching for existing buildings to renovate with the caveat that they are on major bus routes and easily accessible.
A director of community services will be hired by BHD in the coming months to manage the opening of both facilities. The county will also hire certified peer specialists, psychiatric nurses and clinicians. The number of mental health professionals staffing the facilities has not yet been determined.
“We’re going to try to give them as many services as we can,” Lorenz said. “It’s exciting — exciting times. It’s a time of change and redesign in our county mental health system.”
Peter Hoeffel, chapter administrator of the National Alliance on Mental Illness of Greater Milwaukee, applauded the county’s plan.
“I think it’s a great idea,” Hoeffel said. “It’s long overdue. The location of the Milwaukee Mental Health Complex (in the Milwaukee Regional Medical Center in Wauwatosa) is not in the community, so it’s not an easy access point. People don’t end up getting out there until they are acutely ill.”
The Mental Health Complex is outside of city of Milwaukee neighborhoods where many of its patients live. And those patients often do not have easy access to transportation.
The county’s Mental Health Complex came under increased scrutiny more than five years ago among a litany of scandals and complaints, that extend decades, regarding out-dated treatment practices.
Several changes, such as adding community-based wraparound service centers for the mentally ill, are being implemented. But Hoeffel feels the county could be doing more.
“The county is moving in the right direction, but it’s not moving fast enough,” he said. “A lot of the changes that are happening, although it’s great they’re happening, they could’ve been happening 10 years ago.”
He said that while two new mental health facility locations are a great start — and he acknowledged the county is navigating budget constraints — he thinks there should be four mental health facilities; one for the north, south, east and west quadrants of the city.
“It’s frustrating,” Hoeffel said. “Change comes slowly in Milwaukee. And Milwaukee comes with a whole slew of different challenges, not just in mental health. Because people often times with mental illness are marginalized, resources and attention don’t go their way until there’s crisis. If some of these changes had been made years ago there’d be less burden on the system.”
Lorenz is acutely aware of the county’s mental health care access problems, and said BHD is using data obtained from its mental health patients to determine which areas on the north and south sides have the highest concentration of people and families who receive mental health treatment from the county.
“We’re looking to see where we’ll see increased utilization,” Lorenz said. “We’re mapping data to see where most people who get (treatment) tend to be coming from and we’re going to be trying to work within that geographically.”
The centers will not offer emergency hospitalization, but will serve as an access point for people experiencing a mental health crisis.
Lorenz hopes the centers will increase access for those who currently receive mental health services and bring in more people who may have needed treatment, but were unable or unwilling to receive it before.
“We’re really trying to do person-centered care and services,” Lorenz said. “So we have to think about what that would look like, physically; Wrapping services around that person.”
More details about the county’s plans will be finalized this spring.
