The state Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs has awarded the Blair Drug and Alcohol Partnerships $772,000 to help UPMC Altoona establish a separate behavioral health space within its Emergency Department.

The proposed $1.3 million project will enable the hospital to provide better, more efficient and kinder care when patients arrive in psychological distress or substance use crisis, hospital officials have said.

The hospital has already obtained $250,000 through the U.S. Department of Health Resources and Services with the help of U.S. Rep. John Joyce, R-Altoona, and it has asked City Council for $100,000 and the Blair County Commissioners for $200,000 to fund the project.

The Substance Abuse Disorder and Crisis Stabilization grant that BDAP has obtained will go toward the remodeling necessary to create the Emergency Psychiatric Assessment Treatment and Healing (EmPATH) unit in the emergency room, according to BDAP Executive Director Judy Rosser.

State Rep. Jim Gregory, R-Hollidaysburg, learned about the grant opportunity on Dec. 2 and contacted Rosser right away, Gregory said Wednesday.

The offering was highly competitive, and there wasn’t much time to apply, Gregory said.

And a hospital partner was needed, he stated.

So Gregory introduced Rosser to UPMC Altoona President Jan Fisher, and their respective teams put the application together, Gregory said.

BDAP was one of four recipients for $9 million in available money statewide.

“It was crucial we did that so quickly,” Gregory said. “I facilitated it, brought them together, and they did all the hard work.”

The application emphasized community “buy-in” and agency collaboration, Rosser said.

Gregory is passionate about mental health and addiction issues and sought his current position to make a difference in those areas, he said.

It was fitting that the news came on the 13th anniversary of the beginning of his ongoing recovery from drugs and alcohol addiction, Gregory said.

His struggles with addiction began at age 14 and lasted until he was 48, he said.

“You can turn something really bad in your life to something good,” Gregory said. “I hope people take note of where I was, and what I can do now; others can do the same.”

The proposed EmPATH unit will help provide a place for people like the man who threw a crucifix through the window of Gregory’s local office in 2021 as a result of mental health issues.

For lack of such a place, the man was not eligible for involuntary commitment or prison and he was sent home after the incident, Gregory said.

The new unit will help enable nurses and law enforcement officers to more usefully focus their efforts, Gregory said.

In addition to expediting care for behavioral health patients, the living-room-like unit would reduce patients’ tendency to “escalate” in response to the hubbub of the regular Emergency Department, according to hospital representatives.

Keeping such patients out of the regular emergency waiting room makes it safer for the behavioral health patients themselves and the regular patients, representatives said.