THE BRONX: New Clinic To Offer "Immediate" Mental Health Services

BRONX (NYC) NY: For decades, the city has relied on NYPD officers to respond to mental health crises — and offered few alternatives to emergency rooms for people in crisis who are seeking help. 

The new Bronx Support and Connection Center at 3050 White Plains Rd., near the Bronx’s Gun Hill Houses, will support the city’s efforts to shift its crisis response efforts away from those avenues.

The new facility will offer “robust clinical services” through the nonprofit Samaritan Daytop Village, including primary and psychiatric care, counseling, health screenings and withdrawal treatment.

The center, which will serve as a “sister site” to the East Harlem Support and Connection Center at 179 E. 116th St., has on-site showers, laundry areas and access to food.

Visitors will be able to stay there for “hours to days, depending on the needs of the community member. 

The NYPD has come under fire time after time for its handling of calls reporting people experiencing mental health crises. Deborah Danner and Kawaski Trawick number among those who were fatally shot by police during incidents their families say were simply cries for help.

Last year, the city rolled out a pilot program in Harlem known as B-HEARD — short for the Behavioral Health Emergency Assistance Response Division — that it said would provide a “health-centered response to 911 mental health calls.”

As part of the program, “B-HEARD teams” comprising EMTs, paramedics and NYC Health + Hospitals mental health professionals began responding to some 911 calls.

Mayor Adams' administration earlier this year said it would expand the program to the South Bronx, as well as Washington Heights.

The new Bronx clinic aims to bolster the city’s ongoing efforts by serving patients referred to it by B-HEARD teams.

It will also, however, welcome walk-in visits.

The Bronx has one of the highest rates of psychiatric hospitalizations in the city, in addition to a high volume of 911 calls reporting mental health crises.