A new proposed psychiatric treatment facility in Logan County will allow kids currently being treated out of state to come back to West Virginia, and hopefully, transition out of institutional care and back into their communities, state Department of Health and Human Resources officials said Tuesday.
The proposed facility has raised controversy as DHHR Secretary Karen Bowling recommended that it move forward just three weeks after the U.S. Department of Justice officially reprimanded West Virginia for housing too many kids in similar institutions, in violation of their civil rights.
The West Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union launched a campaign on Monday to stop the construction of the facility, and to use the savings for alternative, community-based programs.
On Tuesday, Nancy Exline, commissioner for the DHHR's Bureau for Children and Families, emphasized that the review of the proposed facility -- called the Dazzy Vance Mountain Retreat -- has been going on for at least a year and has been done in accordance with state code.
She said the facility is necessary, as a step in a "continuum of care," to transition kids in West Virginia's mental health system, eventually, back to their communities.
There are 73 kids currently in the custody of the Bureau for Children and Families who are being treated in psychiatric facilities out of state, Exline said.
There are an additional 102 children being treated out of state, who still are in the custody of their families.
There are only 98 beds at residential psychiatric treatment facilities in West Virginia, Exline said.
"We have a need for these type of services," she said. "Quite frankly, for children to be safe at home in West Virginia, they first have to get back into West Virginia."
The Dazzy Vance facility would be built at the Earl Ray Tomblin Industrial Park in Holden, across the street from the Southwestern Regional Jail.
It would have 70 beds, in three different units, and would house children between the ages of 4 and 21. The separate units would house children based on their age and gender.
While construction of the $10.8 million facility would be privately funded, it would eventually earn almost all of its income through the state, by billing Medicaid.
Construction on the facility has not begun, said David Quick, an accountant with Trinity Health Care Services, the company that plans to build Dazzy Vance. Quick said there was no timeline yet for the facility, but that they would know more in a few weeks.
Trinity would bill Medicaid up to $500 per child, per day for services, far more than it costs to treat kids with services within the community.
But, for some children, this type of facility is necessary, said Cindy Beane, acting commissioner of DHHR's Bureau for Medical Services.
"A child's record is clinically reviewed and a doctor has to order this service and they have to have clinical need for this type of service," Beane said. "The goal is for them to receive this service closer to home so their parents can be close to them."
In October, the DHHR will launch a new pilot project, called Safe at Home West Virginia, with the goal of keeping more kids in their communities and out of foster care and institutions, in accordance with the Department of Justice's report.
Funded by a federal grant, the program will initially launch in five counties in southwestern West Virginia and three in the Eastern Panhandle.
"We are working on an entire change in the way that we look at children in any type of residential services," Exline said. "We're hoping that starting in October we'll begin to see the result of really focusing on that community-based aspect for children."
Reach David Gutman at david.gutman@wvgazette.com, 304-348-5119 or follow @davidlgutman on Twitter.