The Robert Brown Crisis Center, a short-term mental health overnight home in Holland, closed June 30, leaving some employees feeling blindsided and other locals concerned about one less resource to divert individuals in crisis from psychiatric hospitalization.
The program was organized by Hope Network in partnership with Ottawa County Community Mental Health and similar departments in Allegan and Muskegon. But after the latter partners pulled out, Ottawa County was left to foot the six-bed bill alone.
“That left Ottawa County CMH to buy or pre-pay for all of those beds (daily), and we weren’t utilizing up to six people a day,” said CMH Executive Director Michael Brashears. “We were losing money.”
Ottawa County will now use other crisis centers in Muskegon and Grand Rapids, according to Brashears, in addition to partnering with Holland Hospital for a partial hospitalization program.
The decision to close Robert Brown was mutual, Brashears said, between Ottawa County and Hope Network. The cost per bed was around $500 per day.
A full psychiatric hospital stay can cost between $890 and $1,200 per day, but crisis residential services are voluntary.
“It wasn’t forced to close due to Medicaid funding issues or budget issues,” Brashears said. “It just didn’t make fiscal sense any longer, and we had a way to address the clinical needs of our folks without (it).”
Ottawa County and Hope Network, he said, are currently exploring ways to reuse the space for a different purpose, including perhaps a residential setting for “folks with intellectual and developmental disabilities, adults that have a hard time finding a place.”
The loss isn’t expected to affect the number of psychiatric hospitalizations in Ottawa County.
“We did a comprehensive report,” Brashears said.
Scrambling for new employment
And yet, the closure surprised employees, who said they were informed only a few days in advance.
“There’s quite a few of us in the same boat, where we’re scrambling for new employment,” Erin Betancourt, who started at Robert Brown three months ago, told The Sentinel. “My family isn’t going to have health insurance for three months because I have a 90-day wait. I may have to apply for Medicaid.”
Longtime employee Aisha Smith worries about community impact.
“I think it’ll take some time before (we) even see the impact of the loss,” she said.
— Cassidey Kavathas is the politics and court reporter at The Holland Sentinel. Contact her at ckavathas@hollandsentinel.com. Follow her on Twitter @cassideykava.
This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Employees ‘scrambling’ after closure of Robert Brown Crisis Center in Holland
Reporting by Cassidey Kavathas, Holland Sentinel / The Holland Sentinel
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