Burke County approves purchase and $6.5 million grant-backed plan for facility-based crisis center

The Burke County Board of Commissioners on Wednesday approved buying a 2.2-acre parcel at 722 East Union Street and authorized county contracts and a project ordinance to use a grant the manager described as $6.5 million to develop a facility-based treatment and crisis stabilization center.

County Manager told the board the site includes a roughly 6,500-square-foot building and is zoned appropriately for the intended use. He said the county envisions the property as “another asset of the recovery system” to provide a behavioral health urgent care and crisis detox stabilization arm that can triage people into outpatient and recovery services. The manager said there is no local match for the grant and that the facility would ultimately be privately run and sustained through billing and other revenue rather than long-term county operation.

The manager described the grant and property as part of a broader strategy to reduce overdoses, expand recovery pathways and link post-overdose response teams to a clearer point of entry into care. He told the board the purchase price read into the record was $870,000 and said the county plans to use the remainder of the grant for rehabilitation and additional building square footage.

During the meeting the board approved three motions related to the project: a motion to purchase the real property at 722 East Union Street, a motion authorizing contracts between Partners Health Management and Burke County to use the grant funds as presented, and a motion adopting capital project budget ordinance number 2026-03 to appropriate the grant. Each motion passed by a hand vote, five to zero.

Commissioners emphasized the project’s role in an evolving local recovery ecosystem that the board has been building with opioid settlement dollars, including intensive outpatient counseling and family-centered recovery initiatives. County officials said a more detailed clinical and programmatic briefing will be presented at an upcoming work session.

The board did not detail the full contracts total in clear transcript numbers beyond the manager’s description of the $6.5 million award; the meeting record also includes a contracts figure read as “6,53,541” (as recorded in the meeting transcript). The manager said the county does not plan to operate the facility long-term and expects partner providers to manage clinical operations.

Next steps include closing on the real property and executing contracts and the project ordinance to allow drawdown of grant funds for renovation and program startup. The board scheduled deeper program and data briefings at a subsequent work session.