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Albany County amends 2025 mental‑health budget to expand mobile outreach, fund recovery center and move jail addiction funds
Summary
The Legislature's Health Committee approved multiple mental‑health budget amendments, including $966,388 over three years to expand a mobile outreach and overdose‑response team, $535,000 in state funding for a recovery center, and a $278,450 transfer to sheriff‑run jail addiction services.
The Albany County Legislature's Health Committee on May 1 approved several 2025 budget amendments to expand county mental‑health services, including a multiyear expansion of mobile outreach teams, a state‑funded recovery center contract and a transfer of jail addiction funds to the sheriff's department.
The committee voted to amend the Department of Mental Health budget to add $966,388 over three years to support the county's Mobile Outreach, Treatment and Overdose Response (MOTOR) program, which county staff said will create two full outreach teams and add three new staff positions. "The goal is to maximize and enhance what we're doing right now," said Dr. Giordano of the Department of Mental Health, who presented the request and said two customized vans are expected to arrive in June and July.
The MOTOR program performs mobile outreach, links people to the substance abuse clinic, and responds to nonfatal overdoses reported by police. Dr. Giordano said the county currently partners with police departments in Colonie and Guilderland and fields roughly 300 cases a year for laboratory or coroner‑related work in another agenda item. He told the committee the expansion would allow the county to provide two full teams for countywide response and community outreach.
Also approved was a $535,000 state grant, routed through the county, to support Second Chance Opportunities, a recovery center described by county staff as a program for people who have completed initial substance‑use treatment and need continued recovery services. Dr. Giordano said the Office of Addiction Services and Supports (OASAS) — referred to in the meeting as OASIS — provided the operating funds to the county, and that the county already put a contract in place in February to receive and pass the funding to the recovery center.
Separately, the committee approved an amendment moving $278,450 in jail‑based addiction services funding from Addiction Care Center Albany (ACCA) to the Albany County Sheriff's Department. Presenters said ACCA had not been operating at previously funded levels in the jail after COVID disrupted services; the state sought to redirect the award to the sheriff's department, which had already been providing the services in the interim.
Committee members asked about the stability of state and federal funding for these programs. Dr. Giordano and county staff said state and federal grant decisions are fluid; staff reported daily updates from state offices and ongoing contingency planning at the county Office of Management and Budget level. "Right now, our services are intact," Dr. Giordano said; county budget staff said they are reviewing line‑by‑line which funds are federal, state (federal pass‑through) or local to prepare for possible cuts.
Motions for the budget amendments were moved and seconded on the record and approved by the committee. The actions were described as amendments to the 2025 mental‑health budget to enable program expansion and to transfer existing state funds per the state's direction.
Looking ahead, committee members requested an update next month about contingency planning for potential cuts to federal and state behavioral‑health funding.
