Teen mental health facility greenlit in Colorado community, as neighbors worry about safety
One Colorado town is making moves for youth mental health. Twenty percent of teens ages 12 to 17 reported suffering from one major depressive disorder in the last year, according to Sandstone Care. Now, the town council has voted to rezone a former assisted living facility to allow for a mental health treatment center serving teens.
The soon-to-be Sandstone Care treatment facility is at 864 Barranca Drive in the Metzler Ranch neighborhood of Castle Rock. However, some nearby residents are worried about the safety concerns they say Sandstone Care will bring.
"Great, now we gotta watch out for what's really gonna be happening, like crime and things like that," said Metzler Ranch neighbor Miles Negley.
Negley worries the facility will bring trouble into town.
"Why in my backyard? There's a lot of kids in this neighborhood and they just didn't seem to care about that," Negley said.
Negley has a three-year-old child and points out that The Goddard School is just across the street from the facility.
"I absolutely can understand that neighbors have concerns," said Halcy Driskell, director of behavioral healthcare at Sandstone Care.
Driskell says Sandstone Care heard resident concerns in three neighborhood meetings and wants to reassure neighbors that the facility won't house anyone with a violent past or history of substance abuse.
"We're going to be providing services to kiddos who really need it, and those kiddos are not kiddos who are criminals, they don't have a past of being aggressive," Driskell said.
The facility will provide voluntary, in-patient mental health care to teens aged 13 to 17, specifically those with mood disorders.
"Like anxiety, depression, OCD that have brought them to a place where it's severely impacting their overall life in school, work, and at home," Driskell said.
She says it fills a need not currently being met in Douglas County.
"This teen residential in Castle Rock is something that our communities, and in Colorado in general, really need. As you know, we've had a huge increase in mental health needs, especially for teens, in the last several years," Driskell said.
Negley agrees there's a need for this kind of service but doesn't think Metzler Ranch is the right place.
"Why in a neighborhood? I'm not against kids getting help, especially these days. They need help. But I don't understand why they need to put it in the backyard of a bunch of houses," Negley said, "I don't know who these kids are, where they're coming from. They can even come from out of state too, so that's, again, kinda concerning for me and my family," Negley said.
"I'm not worried about that, not at all," said Rhonda Akhihiero.
Akhihiero doesn't have a problem with the facility, even though her nephew and his 1- and 3-year-old children live just feet from it.
"It's not like there's prisoners all over the place, you know, it's a mental health facility for young adults, you know, teenagers, so I think it'd be a good idea," Akhihiero said.
The facility will be able to hold up to 36 teens at one time, and most will stay for 45 to 60 days.
Because it is a voluntary check-in facility, teens getting treatment can leave whenever they want, but would need to leave with a parent or guardian.
"We do have an eyes-on policy, and we use Observe Smart, which is a bracelet tracking service so that we can ensure that we know where everyone is all the time," Driskell said.
Even after attending the neighborhood meetings and the town council vote, Negley still isn't convinced the facility's security precautions will keep his neighborhood safe. Many neighbors echo his concern on social media.
"What if one of them decides they don't wanna listen to their parents and they just bolt out, you know?" Negley said. "I think we all know kids can easily get a wristband off if they want to."
Driskell says kids from across the country could seek treatment there, but Sandstone Care wants to focus on serving the local community. They also hope to keep care accessible and say mental health treatment through Sandstone is typically covered by insurance.
Sandstone Care hopes to open the facility in early 2025.
