The former National Guard armory building on Purvis to Baxterville Road in Purvis is set to serve as a crisis stabilization unit and diversion center for individuals in mental health or substance abuse crises, after the building was recently acquired from the city by the Lamar County Board of Supervisors.
Lamar County Administrator Jody Waits said the facility will allow those individuals to receive treatment without having to go through the jail system, which is currently one of the only options in that matter.
“We’ve been working on this project for about two or three years at this point,” he said. “Currently, in Lamar County, if you’re in a mental health crisis or a substance abuse crisis and you’re encountered by law enforcement or emergency management services, their only option is to take you to the county jail and hold you there while they go through the process of getting you services.
“Or, if a loved one comes to the chancery court system and wants to commit a loved one because of those same issues, our only option now is we have to take them into the jail first, while they await a bed or treatment or services. That’s the way it is, so the need is to divert them from that, to get them straight into a treatment center, and that’s what this will be.”
The upcoming facility will house crisis intervention teams that work with the Lamar County Sheriff’s Office and Pine Belt Mental Healthcare, offering onsite intervention to individuals undergoing crisis.
“They usually assess the person there on site, and if they need some intervention, they would then go to this stabilization unit for immediate treatment,” Waits said. “They’d be held for a few days for treatment, maybe a week or so, and then re-introduced back into the community to their home, and some sort of community support program to help their need without having to put them through the jail situation.
“Currently, the intent is to have Pine Belt Mental Healthcare operate it for us, and they’ve put together an entire plan of what it would take to operate that facility. We’ve worked with them to create a budget and an operating plan.”
If all goes according to plan, the project will go out to bid in January, at which point supervisors will review contracts to approve the lowest and best offer received from bidding companies.
The project is made possible with cooperation of officials from Forrest County, the City of Hattiesburg and the Mississippi Legislature. In particular, during last year’s Legislative session, lawmakers awarded the county $500,000 for work on the facility, which is located adjacent to First Baptist Church of Purvis.
The county also has a $2.2 million grant from the federal government for the project.
“We have a little over $5 million that we’ll use to remodel the building, and then begin to operate it from there,” Waits said. “
The former National Guard building was first occupied in 1953. It originally served as home for several engineering companies, including the Concrete Team, the 250th Engineering Detachment and Detachment 1 of Headquarters and Headquarters Company, which all part of the 890th Engineer Company.
In October 2020, the building was released to the City of Purvis before being taken over by the county.
