EVERETT — U.S. Sen. Patty Murray toured a soon-to-open behavioral health facility on Friday as the nonprofit operating it seeks federal funding to complete the project.
Compass Health, a behavioral health care nonprofit that runs the Andy’s Place supportive housing facility in Everett, is spending $71.5 million to complete the new behavioral health center next door, set to open in July. The new facility will be used to provide intensive treatment, both voluntary and involuntary, to people undergoing mental health crises.
Much of the money for the project came from state-level investment. The nonprofit hopes to get an additional $2.41 million in federal dollars via Murray, a long-serving Democrat lawmaker from Bothell. Congress, which narrowly avoided a government shutdown in December via a temporary spending measure, needs to pass a spending appropriation bill by March 14. Murray said she will work to keep that $2.41 million in the upcoming bill.
“Mental health is an issue for everybody. The issue of substance abuse is an issue for everyone,” Murray said Friday. “We know more and more that treating people is absolutely the best answer, and doing it with dignity is critical. So a facility like this that is welcoming, that helps people with their health and their recovery is essential to them, their families, and really to the health and safety of an entire community.”
Sixteen beds at the new facility will be used for involuntary, court-ordered treatment for people found to be a danger to themselves or somebody else, said Compass Health CEO Tom Sebastian on Friday. Those individuals would otherwise be sent to the Western State Hospital in Lakewood.
Going to a treatment center such as Compass Health’s, he said, can allow people to be stabilized within seven to eight days. The nonprofit already operates a similar facility in Mukilteo.
Another 16 beds will be set aside for any community member going through “self-defined behavioral health crises,” Sebastian said. The building will also house office space for crisis prevention and outreach. The nonprofit expects it to serve about 1,300 people each year.
Construction on the new building began in 2023, replacing a facility originally built in 1920 that didn’t meet modern standards for mental health treatment, Sebastian previously said.
“The main barrier was the dilapidated condition of the [previous] building,” Sebastian said Friday. “People just didn’t want to stay there, it wasn’t therapeutic. The opportunity to actually design the building in a way that creates that therapeutic environment is just super exciting.”
The new facility, not yet named, is referred to as “Phase 2” of a three-part project taken on by Compass Health, which began with the opening of Andy’s Place in 2021. The nonprofit, which operates in five western Washington counties, is rebuilding the 3300 block of Broadway to increase its housing capacity while providing more mental health and substance abuse treatment options. The specifics of the project’s third phase are not yet known.
During her visit to Everett, the senator also met with local labor leaders and union members to hold a roundtable discussion on new legislation, the Social Security Fairness Act, that restored full retirement benefits for 42,000 former government employees in Washington. Nearly 3 million people nationwide will receive additional Social Security benefits due to the bill, co-sponsored by Murray.
Will Geschke: 425-339-3443; william.geschke@heraldnet.com; X: @willgeschke.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
Gallery
