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From the CEO David Schimmel

Due to your overwhelming response to our e-mail campaign in June, to advocate to the Collier County Board of Commissioners in support of our request for additional operational funding for the expanded Crisis Stabilization Unit, they voted unanimously to help us ensure the availability of emergency mental health treatment that is so vital to the security and safety of our community.

This, together with significant lead gifts contributed from the estates of two longtime generous donors James P. Dupey and Doug and Mercy Bathey, parents of our namesake David Lawrence Bathey, we are extremely pleased to share that construction is well underway.

As a community, we came together to show our support for expanded emergency services realizing that an opportunity to save a life can be fleeting and that when someone is ready to change, we shouldn’t have to tell him or her to wait a little longer. For the last five years, the Center has gotten by with a grossly inadequate facility built originally in 1986. This resulted in the Center turning away 600 people a year in crisis, and making countless others wait for treatment.

The David Lawrence Centers and Foundation Board of Directors are diligently committed to raising the remaining funds necessary to expand the Crisis Stabilization Unit that will double the capacity to treat patients in crisis and add an additional 14 beds. The plans will bring this to a 30-bed unit with the capability to add more beds as our community’s needs grow further. This will mean that 800 more people in need of emergency care will find help each year. In addition to reducing the strain on emergency rooms and the community, this expansion will assure that everyone in need of urgent care receives the most immediate and effective treatment possible.

Gulf Coast Construction is the general contractor and PK Studios is the architect of what will be our community’s new world-class, state-of-the-art, therapeutic treatment space worthy of the citizens of this world-class community.

We need your support to help us in our efforts. Many naming opportunities exist for memorializing or honoring friends and family members ranging from naming the Acute Care Building to naming a bedroom. We have many needs throughout the Crisis Stabilization Unit expansion for your kind and thoughtful philanthropic support. For more information or to learn how you can be an important part of this life changing project, please contact Steve Wheeler, Chief Development Officer, at 239-354-1416.