A proposed behavioral health crisis center planned for Cleveland’s Central neighborhood will have all sorts of services on-site – psychiatry, detoxification for addiction, therapy and a pharmacy.
But it won’t have an emergency room to treat pressing medical problems.
That’s a frustration for the Cleveland Association of Rescue Employees, the union representing Cleveland EMS employees. Without a co-located medical emergency room, the group opposes plans for the new crisis center, it wrote in a recent letter to the Cuyahoga County Council.
“Many of our patients have both mental health and physical health concerns,” the letter read. “It is critical that we stop treating mental and physical health in separate silos and start building facilities that can address both.”
The union is concerned the new crisis center could become “yet another outpatient facility that constantly calls EMS because they aren’t set up to provide comprehensive care.” It pointed to the county jail, which has medical and behavioral health staff on-site, as an example. Cleveland EMS was called to the jail more than 1,200 times in 2024.
Diversion Center to close once new crisis center opens
The new center will be another stab by local leaders at addressing the interlocking challenges of mental health, addiction and criminal justice. A diversion center that opened in 2021 was meant to act as an alternative to jail for people in mental health or addiction crisis, but its usage was low. A new psychiatric emergency room in Cleveland Heights has also seen low occupancy.
Cuyahoga County Council will vote Sept. 23 on whether to invest $7 million into the crisis center. In a statement, council president Dale Miller wrote that an on-site emergency room would be “ideal.”
“But things are rarely perfect, and you can’t have everything,” Miller wrote.
Brandy Carney, Cuyahoga County’s director of public safety and justice services, wrote in an email that the crisis center has the support of Cleveland leadership for public safety and the Cuyahoga County Fire Chief’s Association. Medical directors of local hospitals are excited for the center, she added.
“I truly feel it’s just a little early in the process, and they haven’t yet learned enough about the project,” Carney wrote of the union’s concerns.
Members of the Cuyahoga County Council, including Miller, had previously expressed some hesitancy about making the $7 million investment, due to lack of clarity around the crisis center’s funding sources. But Miller said that his confidence level is now higher after receiving additional funding information. The Centers, a social service nonprofit that owns the building and would operate the facility, shared some of those details publicly last Tuesday.
The Centers recently shared plan to pay for facility
The first and second floor of the facility will cost $26.3 million to build. To reach that number, the Centers is relying on a hodgepodge of sources, including $6.8 million from the state of Ohio, $7 million from Cuyahoga County’s opioid fund and $6 million in tax credits that still need to be awarded.
Operating the facility will cost between $13 and $14 million a year. For the first three years it’s open, the Centers plans to rely on a split between annual funding from the ADAMHS board, insurance reimbursements and more county opioid funds. The opioid funds will eventually run out. Eric Morse, the CEO and president of the Centers, said possible future funding sources include support from local hospital systems and a changed insurance reimbursement system that covers more of the true cost.
“I feel really good about the first three years,” Morse said. “I’d also say, as a nonprofit executive, I can’t count one more instance where I knew I had three years of operating funds. That just isn’t the way nonprofits are unfortunately able to work, because things change so quickly.”