A pre-arrest diversion center — designed to keep people out of the notoriously overcrowded Fulton County Jail for nonviolent and minor offenses — is now open 24 hours, seven days a week in Atlanta.
The Center for Diversion and Services is located within the city’s detention center and will provide resources related to mental health, substance use and extreme poverty, including immediate help and connection to long-term support. Officials opened the center at a ceremony on Monday.
“This is a very, very critical turning point in addressing public safety in Atlanta,” Mayor Andre Dickens said. “It’s our responsibility to stand in the gap for Atlanta and metro Atlanta’s most vulnerable residents.”
Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Grady Hospital System will operate the center. CEO and President John Haupert said he expects the center will divert 14% of the individuals brought by police to Grady Hospital’s emergency psychiatric unit, “potentially freeing up 130 psychiatric emergency room beds a month at the hospital.”
“The diversion center will provide a necessary alternative for people who were headed to jail, for people who encounter police due to being unhoused, experiencing mental health or substance use issues, and for those who are living in poverty,” Haupert said. “These are all health care issues, not criminal issues.”
When police get calls about trespassing, loitering, mental health episodes, public intoxication or other minor offenses, they can bring them to the center where they can eat, take showers, wash clothes, sober up and spend the night.
The center has temporary beds and several individual rooms for counseling and health checkups. The walls and furniture are bright and colorful, featuring local artwork to represent hope, growth, healing and transformation.
Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The services don’t have a time limit, and individuals can choose which services with which they want to engage. They can also connect with long-term programs based on individual needs, including legal help, housing, rehabilitation, and health care.
The city of Atlanta, Fulton County, Grady Hospital, the city’s Policing Alternatives & Diversion Initiative (PAD) and several other organizations partnered to fund and operate the center, which has been years in the making.
The city covered the $3 million renovation costs and will split the $5 million annual operating costs with Fulton County.
Programs that aim to rehabilitate individuals and have been shown to reduce recidivism and thus reduce costs on the criminal justice system.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney said many people get caught in a vicious cycle, returning to jail 20 or 30 times a year for minor offenses before ending up in his courtroom.
“We have for too long said, ‘That’s a trespasser. That’s a drunk. That’s a homeless guy. It’s a problem, it’s an arrest, it’s a case, it’s an indictment, it’s a defendant for the public defender’s office,’” McBurney said. “Well, wait. That’s a person. That’s a person with a story. It’s a person with some problems, but that person isn’t the problem. That is a neighbor. That’s a community member.
“If you become person-focused and not problem-focused, you can have that impact.”
Ben Gray for the AJC
Ben Gray for the AJC
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