By Kathy Chouteau
Contra Costa Health Services (CCHS) on Friday cut the ribbon on a new mental health and addiction-treatment services center in San Pablo.
The West County Behavioral Health Center at 13585 San Pablo Ave., situated next to the similarly designed West County Health Center, officially opens Monday, March 9. It will serve approximately 2,300 adults and 400 children annually, according to CCHS Behavioral Health Services Director Suzanne Tavano.
The center will replace the aging county mental health clinics at 41st Street in Richmond and also on El Portal Drive in San Pablo.
“We’re really excited about this,” said Tavano, who was among about 150 community members and stakeholders at the ribbon cutting ceremony Friday. “The heart of the organization is all of the people who work in the programs. Our staff, on a daily basis, are walking alongside the people we serve so that they really understand what their life is like.”
Tavano added, “When we walk the path with our clients, what we realize is that helping them with food, clothing, shelter, being a part of the community, living a meaningful life, is really what we’re about.”
Mental health services available for adults will include medication support; psychiatric nursing care; case management; group/individual therapy; wraparound services; alcohol & drug related care; homeless services; financial services; independent living skills and more.
The center’s Child & Adolescent Services staff will provide integrated mental health and substance abuse treatment, including a diverse range of outpatient mental health services, i.e., individual, family and group therapy. Medication support services, case management and wraparound services are also available for youth.
“This center is more than a building,” County Supervisor John Gioia said. “It represents our county’s commitment to health care, especially mental health care, for residents in our county, respect for our patients, respect for our residents, and respect for our staff who work in this wonderful facility.”
Supervisor Gioia highlighted that clients will be served at the center “in nine different languages across a range of services” and that they will be “really empowered to be successful because of the great work that our health care staff will do in this building.”
Hawley Peterson & Snyder Architects—which designed the next-door West County Health Center—assisted the center with design features that helped “tie the buildings together,” according to Steve Harris, CCHS director of planning and evaluation. With the involvement of health services staff, architecture firm HED then handled the “nitty gritty” of construction design, he said. Richmond’s Overaa Construction built the facility, which took 14 months. Overall, 47,000 project hours were spent on the design, pre-construction and construction phases.
The new center has LEED Silver status, per Harris, making it a “very green building.” It features 50-plus patient care and therapy rooms; houses the aforementioned children and adult-focused programs; and a training center.
Adult Services hours at the center are Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.; and Children & Family Services hours are Monday through Thursday 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Friday 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. The center is closed Saturday, Sunday and holidays.
For more info click here or call 510.942.4700 (adults) or 510.942.4600 (children).
