Area Facing Mental Health ‘Crisis,’ Experts Say
By Ashley Meeks, Las Cruces Sun-News, N.M.
Jul. 17–LAS CRUCES — A third of the inmates in the Dona Ana County Detention Center are in need of mental health services, according to the county, but the closest place for them to be treated is a $5,000 trip away at the state’s institute in Las Vegas.
Silvia Sierra, the county’s Health and Human Services Director, says the county is facing “crisis” when it comes to mental health.
The key to addressing it, she told the Legislative Health and Human Services interim committee during its Wednesday meeting in Las Cruces, is a crisis triage center, where detainees “in distress can be assessed, stabilized and referred.”
The county is hoping to get state funding during the upcoming legislative session for a proposed $1.5 million facility, to be located west of Las Cruces, which would provide about care to nonviolent detainees for stays between 48 hours to five days, at a cost of $5 million a year.
The detention center does provide some services already, but those are limited to including Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings, anger management and women’s health services and drug and alcohol abuse and sexual assault prevention. According to the language of the 2007 Senate Joint Memorial advocating the
feasibility of a center, new services would include crisis triage, a mobile crisis team and pre-trial services.
“We’re criminalizing the mentally ill,” Sierra said. “We need to shift that mindset.”
Eddy Broadway, the CEO of ValueOptions New Mexico, a partner of the New Mexico Interagency Behavioral Health Purchasing Collaborative, said the need for such a facility was one of the “gaps” in the state’s mental health system.
“This proposal’s a good example of how the collaborative came together and said, “Hey, there’s a missing piece here,’” Broadway said. “Behavioral health can not be isolated from general health.”
Ashley Meeks can be reached at ameeks@lcsun-news.com
If you go
What: Legislative Health and Human Services Committee meeting
When: 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. (public comment at 3:30 p.m.)
Where: Memorial Medical Center, 2450 S. Telshor Blvd. in Las Cruces, Rooms A&B
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