Zumbro Valley Health Center plans residential facility expansion

John Molseed, Post-Bulletin, Rochester, Minn.
·2 min read

Jun. 3—ROCHESTER — The Zumbro Valley Health Center is expanding its residential facility in Rochester — sort of.

On paper, the residential capacity will remain at 16 beds. In practice, the facility will be able to regularly accommodate 16 people, which isn't always the case now.

The Zumbro Valley Health Center provides mental health, substance use disorder and community-based services to people in 12 counties in southeastern Minnesota. The center's Woodlake Drive facility provides residential services for people for up to 90 days and a pair of beds are reserved for crisis patients for up to 10 days.

However, a pair of the rooms in the 2008 building are double-bed rooms. Most of the time, both beds in those rooms aren't filled, said Beth Krehbiel, Zumbro Valley chief executive officer.

"We can never work at true capacity," Krehbiel said. "It's really difficult to find two people who can share a room during a mental health crisis."

Construction of the planned approximately 1,700 square-foot addition is expected to begin this fall, Krehbiel said. The project will turn the two-bed rooms into four single-bed rooms, update some of the facility's common amenities including the kitchen and add group treatment space.

The addition will be completed without disrupting services there, Krehbiel said.

A federal Congressionally Designated Spending Grant through U.S. Sen. Tina Smith's office provided $676,000 in funds for the project. Smith and Sen. Amy Klobuchar both advocated for the funding, which was approved in December.

Krehbiel said the facility and its services are the only of their kind in Southeast Minnesota. The center accepts patients who have no insurance or public insurance plans that have limited mental health treatment coverage.

As that project is under construction, work on the former Northgate Health Club building on Seventh Street NW will be wrapping up. That building will house community-based services including housing services, substance abuse and other counseling. It will also allow the Zumbro Valley Health Center to expand its tobacco cessation services and services for veterans.

Krehbiel said the building will be an asset for people living in the neighborhood in Northwest Rochester.

"It's a bigger facility in a walkable neighborhood and is centrally located to a lot of other services," Krehbiel said. "It will be as much a neighborhood asset as a community asset."