The update
The county recently outlined an $86 million earmark in the fiscal year 2025-26 budget intended for future jail diversion and central booking facilities.
The mental health diversion center, spearheaded by Judge Andy Brown, will be an alternative to jail for people who commit nonviolent crimes and suffer from mental illness or substance abuse disorder.
The diversion center’s design team—comprised of experts from Brinkley Sargent Wiginton Architects, Kirksey Architecture and Pilitzer Bogart & Associates, LLC—provided an update on the project to Travis County Commissioners on Aug. 19.
Project lead Charlie Goodman said the team has visited several sites in downtown Austin and Del Valle, which are currently under evaluation. In tandem, the team has begun hosting various engagement sessions with election officials, mental health service providers and community members.
“We're about ready to get into the meat and potatoes of the programming ... Programming is the way that architects are able to design a building. It's the road map that we use to create,” Goodman said.
This first phase of pre-design work is expected to take around a year and cost $2 million, while formal design work is expected to take another 18-24 months. The final phase of construction is expected to take around three years to complete.
Some context
The diversion center initiative dates back to a 2023 report from the Travis County Forensic Mental Health Project.
Findings indicated roughly 40% of all incarcerated people in the Travis County Jail have mental illnesses. That number jumps to 70%-80% when accounting for people with substance abuse disorder.
The report defined the problem as “people [who] become trapped in or cycle through jail waiting for behavioral health services and solutions.”
The summary called for a multifaceted approach to improving mental health outcomes throughout the county, including:
- Multiagency data sharing
- A mental health diversion center
- Housing programs
- An increase in peer support specialists throughout the mental health and criminal legal systems intersection
- The reinstatement of Counsel at First Appearance, or CAFA
In partnership with the city of Austin, Travis County implemented CAFA starting in 2024, allocating $15.5 million in funding for the program during FY 2024-25. County officials oversaw the ramp-up of the legal services program earlier this year.
CAFA provides every individual with a lawyer during post-arrest evaluations and bail hearings at magistration, regardless of their ability to pay.
What’s happened
In June 2023, Brown announced a multiagency diversion pilot program.
Brown said the three-year pilot is intended to help the county nail down policies that work and ones that don’t before a permanent diversion center is built.
The county partners with Integral Care, the city of Austin, the Austin Police Department, the Travis County Sheriff's Office and others to operate a small-scale diversion program.
The pilot saw the expansion of Integral Care’s Psychiatric Emergency Services, a program that now operates 24/7 to provide immediate care for those in the throes of mental health crises that would otherwise be taken to jail, the emergency room or be homeless.
The existing facility at the Richard E. Hopkins Behavioral Health Building at 1165 Airport Blvd., Austin, added more medical staff, peer support and a new 23-hour observation unit, along with wraparound services such as housing navigation, harm reduction, nutrition counseling and psychiatric care.
In addition, the city-owned Genevieve Tarlton Hearon building at the Waller Creek Greenbelt Trail has been converted into a 25-bed therapeutic diversion center where adults can stay up to 90 days for treatment and stabilization.
The center combines bridge housing with intensive services—including therapy, medication management and case management—and is intended for people at risk of repeatedly cycling through the justice system, hospitals or homelessness.
The county also unveiled a roughly $2 million plan to strengthen its data-sharing system between the Austin Police Department, the Travis County Sheriff’s Office, medical entities and homelessness organizations.
In January, the county approved an interlocal agreement with The University of Texas at Austin Dell Medical School to begin tracking data from the pilot program.
“This contract with Dell Med is to help us digest all the information. It’s to look at what they are learning in that pilot, help us collect the data, help us figure out what data we need to be collecting, and then help us design the services that we need in the permanent diversion center,” Brown told Community Impact earlier this year.
Staff told commissioners that Dell Medical School’s data and analysis are expected to be shared with the planning team in the coming weeks.
By using stakeholder feedback together with the data collected by the medical school, the design task force will be able to understand what the needs and requirements of the building will be, Goodman said.
The outlook
The state-owned Austin State Hospital and space near Central Booking in downtown Austin have been identified as promising sites for the diversion center, Brown previously told Community Impact.
“The goal is to have one place where law enforcement takes people. Whether they're going to the sobering center, diversion center or if they need to be booked in jail, we want it to be very easy for law enforcement to drop people off at one place, so they don't have to keep driving all around town,” Brown said.
He noted that legislative hurdles affect the use of the state building.
Also of note
Reducing recidivism in the criminal justice system has led to savings in neighboring counties. Williamson County, just to the north of Travis County, launched a similar program in 2022.
“It's cost-effective, and it's saving taxpayers money by getting the correct resources out,” said Kathy Pierce, board chair of the Williamson County and Cities Health District, during a review of the Williamson County Diversion program in late 2024.
She said booking an individual in jail is one of the most expensive costs for the county.
By diverting first responders, Williamson County saves an average of $1,367 per call, according to county documents. The average cost of incarceration is $549 a day, with an average stay of five days.
First responders also save time, as looking for a psychiatric hospital bed, transporting individuals to an emergency room or processing them through jail booking can take hours.
Final thoughts
The project team noted that the cost of operating a diversion center will outweigh the cost of the facility itself over the life of the program.
“We're creating a paradigm shift from a focus on incarceration to a focus on diversion and really trying to identify what people actually need,” Travis County Commissioner Brigid Shea said. “... The more complicated question is how we do it, and then how we pay for it.”
