It’s hard to think of anything locally that has been more needed and less productive since its founding than Doña Ana County’s Crisis Triage Center.
In 2012, then-County Manager Brian Haines recognized a serious problem. Law enforcement officers were spending too much time transporting and overseeing criminal suspects in need of a mental health evaluation and, perhaps, involuntary treatment. A trip to the state’s only mental health hospital in Las Vegas would mean 10 hours on the road.
His solution was to spend $2 million to build a crisis triage center. Unfortunately, it was a building without a plan. And for more than eight years it sat empty. It didn’t help that a year after construction, then-Gov. Susana Martinez upended the state’s mental health system in response to unsubstantiated allegations of fraud.
The center finally opened in 2021, but immediately began to experience problems. Six months after its opening, Sheriff Kim Stewart announced that her department would no longer take people to the center after a deputy had been turned away because there was no nurse on duty at the time.
In January, provider RI International ceased operations and the Crisis Triage Center was closed.
Haines wasn’t wrong when he identified the problem nearly two decades ago. At that time, our county jails were being used as de facto mental health centers. That didn’t work well, as evidenced by the $22 million awarded by a federal court to former inmate Stephen Sleven, whose DWI arrest resulted in nearly two years of hideous abuse and neglect in our county jail without his case ever going to trial.
A constitutional amendment reforming our bail system in 2016 ended that practice, but it also resulted in more people with both mental health problems and a criminal history now out on the streets without treatment. Las Cruces Police Chief Jeremy Story tells us a small number of individuals who cannot be held accountable by the courts because of a lack of mental competency are responsible for a disproportionate amount of local crime.
There is hope. The county has found a new provider, PEAK Behavioral Health, to take over the center. They are in the process of obtaining the necessary licenses and intend to reopen soon. The county plans to invest nearly $3 million in the center, and Sheriff Stewart says she has a good working relationship with PEAK Behavioral.
The problem in the past was that there were mixed visions for the center. Haines saw it as a place for involuntary treatment of those accused of crimes. But when it opened, those services weren’t available.
The plan now is to do both. There will be a secured area for involuntary treatment, as well as a wide range of mental health services available to the entire community.
The struggles of the Crisis Triage Center to this point indicate how challenging the problems are. But the plan for the center moving forward is encouraging, if they get the funding needed to execute it.
The plan itself is pretty simple: provide care and treatment for everyone who shows up in need, regardless of who they are, how much money they have and whether they have insurance. If they are successful, it will make a huge difference for those struggling with mental health issues; their families, friends and caregivers; and the entire community.
Walter Rubel can be reached at waltrubel@gmail.com.
