Jennifer Cescolini, Northpointe CEO, was on hand Tuesday along with Chief Clinical Officer Erin Kusz to answer the board’s previously submitted questions.

Kusz reported that Gathering Pointe, a location where Northpointe provides living support and skill building services, has not been closed. Rather it’s been moved to the Windsor Center in Iron River to take advantage of opportunities available there.

Cescolini noted that Gathering Pointe had been used as a drop-in center, which was not an appropriate use, and there has been no elimination of the originally intended services.

Kusz said the Friendship Drop-in Center in Kingsford has not closed. Instead of immediately renewing the annual contract at a higher rate with the Northpointe Board, a temporary extension was issued while areas of concern were evaluated, she said.

Those areas included number of participants, a significant increase in the contract amount, a determination on whether funding other than Northpointe was being sought out, and what programs were being offered.

Kusz said there has been some miscommunication in regards to a drop-in center being located in Iron River. It was not Northpointe that did not approve the drop-in center, it was NorthCare Network in Marquette, which controls the approvals. The reason the drop-in center was not approved was that they are no longer a Medicaid-required service and only existing centers are being supported, Kusz explained.

Cescolini said the fact that the Gathering Pointe was being used as a drop-in center shows there is a need in Iron County. Cescolini said she is looking into opening a center as a satellite of the Kingsford location.

Cescolini also reported that while staff vacancies have been an issue for over 10 years, Iron River is fully staffed. But finding mental health professionals in a rural area remains difficult, she added.

County Attorney Steve Tinti brought up Northpointe’s handling of crisis situations saying that a better job needs to be done. Tying up law enforcement officers for days at time while waiting for patient screenings and hospital beds to become available is not effective, he said.

“We have to improve this because the perception is put out there that Northpointe is not there to help, we need to fix that because a crisis is a crisis and it has to be addressed,” Tinti said.

Sheriff Ryan Boehmke added that currently Northpointe only performs pre-hospitalization screenings for Medicaid patients. It falls on the hospital to perform the rest and many travel doctors will not do them, leaving patients and the officers required to stay with them in limbo for days. Boehmke said he has had officers tied up for three days only to have the person sent home when they were finally screened.

“That is not an answer financially or for that person that is in crisis and needing help to be stuck into a room like a criminal because they are not,” Boehmke said.

Cescolini said that the key takeaway for her is that Northpointe, the county commissioners and law enforcement need to work together to look at how to better handle crises.

Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, in partnership with stakeholders across the state, is in the process of developing a crisis services system for all Michiganders, according to the department’s website. Providers are mostly funded by Medicaid carveout dollars and crisis services have historically targeted people with Medicaid and serious mental illnesses. Few commercial insurers have reimbursement arrangements with crisis service providers, MDHHS says.