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East Central Mental Health has plans on the drawing board to expand its adult services. 

ECMH Executive Director Don Schofield said plans are being made to build a 23-hour crisis diversion center at 200 Cherry Street in Troy. 

“We’re planning to build a crisis diversion center to assess and stabilize patients,” Schofield said. “They’ll be at the facility no longer than 24 hours. If they’re not stable at 23 hours, we’ll transport them to a facility capable of performing the next appropriate level of care.”

Schofield said the planned crisis diversion center would not be a large operation and will be capable of serving about three to four people. He said the center would be staffed 24-hours a day with all necessary professional personnel. He said they may also offer peer counseling because peers sometimes have better luck connecting with people in crisis because they have gone through similar experiences. 

Schofield said in his experience, people in crisis could usually be stabilized within the 23-hour window by getting the patient back on medication. He said if the patient isn’t stabilized within the 23-hour window, they would be transported to another facility for additional care. 

Schofield also said ECMH has a crisis mobile team that went out into the community to assist people in need. He said the crisis center would help bring all of those services together under one roof. 

Schofield said ECMH owns about half of the vacant lot adjacent to the existing East Central office on West Walnut Street. The vacant lot lies between College Street and West Walnut Street. The City of Troy owns half of the lot that’s closer to College Street and ECMH owns the portion of the lot closer to West Walnut Street. For longtime Troy residents, it’s the piece of property where the Cherry Street Elementary school playground was once located.

Schofield said the crisis center would be built on the portion of the vacant lot owned by East Central. Currently, Schofield said the plan is still in the early stages of development and his best guess is that it would take 18 to 24 months for construction to begin. 

East Central Mental Health held a meeting on Monday night to discuss the project, and Jacqueline Brantley Floyd, a College Street resident, attended the meeting. Floyd said she was in opposition to the crisis center.

“Everyone I’ve talked to is against it,” Floyd said. “Everyone understands there’s a problem with the mentally ill and the mentally ill need help. A center like this would be very, very helpful, but it does not need to be in the historical residential section of Troy.”