Board fails to approve $300,000 county match for Service First hotel-to-treatment project

The San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors voted against a motion to allocate $300,000 to Service First of Northern California as part of a required local match to secure $8.2 million in state behavioral-health funds for the Eaton Hotel redevelopment.

Service First Chief Executive Vernell Hill, accompanied by project materials, asked the board to approve a $300,000 county contribution that would be matched by the City of Stockton and by Service First's own funds to meet the state's 10% local-match requirement. Hill said the project would refurbish the nearly vacant Eaton Hotel into a 92-room facility providing treatment, counseling space and activity areas, with at least 16 social-rehab beds and four respite beds certified to state standards. "We expect to have a kitchen, group rooms and private counseling rooms," Hill said, urging supervisors to act quickly because the state set a…