Mental Health Treatment Housing: A Critical Opportunity for Athens
New Mental Health Treatment Housing at Advantage Behavioral Health will be completed in February of 2027
The above presentation summarizes several years of research and data analysis conducted by SafeD Athens on chronic unsheltered homelessness, serious mental illness, public safety, and service delivery in Athens-Clarke County. Our goal is to encourage an evidence-based discussion about how Athens can better serve individuals experiencing severe mental illness while improving safety for everyone in our community.
People experiencing unsheltered homelessness come to Athens from a variety of locations. While many migrate from surrounding counties that have limited behavioral health and homeless services, others arrive from elsewhere in Georgia and from other states, often without established ties to Athens. According to local data, approximately half of Athens-Clarke County’s unsheltered population migrated here from outside the county. Available data consistently identify serious mental illness as a significant contributing factor to chronic unsheltered homelessness. Over the past several years, Athens has experienced an increase in mental health challenges among its unsheltered population, with these issues appearing particularly prevalent among many individuals who have migrated to the community.
Downtown residents, students, business owners, employees, visitors, first responders, and outreach workers have described a wide range of troubling encounters involving individuals in crisis. These include aggressive panhandling, public drug use, assaults, dangerous behavior in traffic, public defecation, and other incidents that have placed both unhoused individuals and community members at risk. In at least two incidents, Advantage Behavioral Health employees were seriously assaulted while performing their jobs.
Recognizing these public safety concerns does not diminish our compassion for those experiencing homelessness. In fact, individuals living unsheltered are themselves at significantly greater risk of becoming victims of assault, exploitation, and other violent crime simply because of their circumstances. We can acknowledge these realities while recognizing that many are living with untreated mental illness and addiction.
For years, SafeD Athens has argued that what we have often described as a “peanut butter sandwich and a prayer” approach is not enough. While emergency assistance and outreach are important, they cannot substitute for comprehensive psychiatric treatment and long-term recovery. Without addressing the root causes of chronic homelessness, we simply perpetuate a cycle of crisis.
One of the greatest challenges is that mental health treatment frequently ends after short-term stabilization. Individuals experiencing psychiatric emergencies often receive crisis intervention and temporary stabilization before being discharged without sufficient long-term treatment or structured follow-up. Many return to the same circumstances that contributed to the crisis, resulting in repeated emergency interventions, incarceration, homelessness, and continued instability.
This revolving-door cycle is reflected in local data. More than half of Advantage Behavioral Health’s homeless clients have cycled through the criminal justice system while remaining chronically homeless. Some individuals continue generating incident reports year after year, with documented law enforcement contacts dating back to 2018 and continuing through 2026.
Athens-Clarke County is fortunate to become home to Georgia’s first Community Service Board Mental Health Treatment Housing (MHTH) program, currently under construction at Advantage Behavioral Health Systems. This innovative transitional housing model represents an important shift toward addressing the underlying causes of chronic homelessness among individuals with serious mental illness and co-occurring substance use disorders.
Unlike traditional emergency stabilization or past off-site transitional housing, the MHTH program will provide residents with up to two years of housing combined with 24/7 access to psychiatric treatment, case management, and recovery services. This extended treatment model allows time to stabilize persistent conditions such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, severe depression, and other serious mental illnesses while helping residents develop the skills needed to live independently.
Without a comprehensive treatment model, Athens will continue to experience unsafe conditions for both untreated individuals living on our streets and the broader community. Scheduled to open in early 2027, the facility represents one of the most significant behavioral health investments in our region. Given limited capacity, priority should be given to individuals with verified, established residency in Athens-Clarke County. Athens simply does not have the resources to serve as the primary provider of intensive behavioral health services for everyone who arrives from elsewhere.
For many years, federal homelessness policy emphasized a Housing First approach that prioritizes permanent housing. While Housing First has successfully increased housing placement for populations, growing research has demonstrated that housing alone is often insufficient for individuals experiencing severe mental illness and addiction without intensive treatment. Increasingly, federal and state policymakers are recognizing the need to pair housing with comprehensive behavioral health services and transitional treatment programs.
Athens is fortunate to be leading Georgia in this effort through the new MHTH program. Likewise, the State of Georgia has recognized significant gaps in behavioral health care by investing in a new state psychiatric hospital to provide desperately needed inpatient treatment for acute psychiatric illness.
It is now time for Athens-Clarke County to recognize these realities. Our community does not have the housing capacity, treatment infrastructure, or financial resources to continue serving as a regional destination for individuals requiring intensive behavioral health and homelessness services. Attempting to do so ultimately fails both Athens residents and the vulnerable individuals seeking help.
SafeD Athens believes our local government should continue investing in treatment and recovery for Athens residents while partnering with neighboring counties, state agencies, and federal partners to expand behavioral health infrastructure throughout Georgia. Decentralizing services across the state—not concentrating them in Athens—will produce better outcomes for individuals in crisis while reducing the burden placed on a single community.
At the same time, local government has a responsibility to protect public safety. That includes evaluating and enforcing effective ordinances addressing aggressive panhandling, dangerous public behavior, chronic loitering, and encampments in inappropriate public spaces. It also includes holding providers accountable, improving coordination among agencies, and making every reasonable effort to determine where individuals have established community connections so they may be referred, whenever appropriate and lawful, to family, support systems, or services closer to their home communities.
Recently, The Globe restaurant in downtown Athens shared the following Facebook post, which generated more than 500 comments:
“Athens needs a new idea. There’s a growing population of individuals that need more help than the people who live and work downtown are able to offer. There are mental health issues at play. There are housing issues to consider. There are financial impacts that are felt. Downtown businesses are filled full of compassionate folks. We offer drinks and foods to people who sleep rough on the streets (at this moment someone sleeps right next to our building in the middle of the sidewalk and has since he came to town a week ago) as we can but are often taken advantage of. Each weekend, I am yelled at by a person I do not know that is suffering in ways I could never imagine for something neither of us know anything about. Our staff is endlessly asked for favors of every kind. Every day, multiple times per day, we clean up piles of trash and scavenged cigarette butts, and we try to keep our corner of the world feeling as new and beautiful as ever. Make no mistake, we are friends with an entire community of folks that we know and who are gentle and kind and simply need support, and they will always, always, always receive our support in any way possible. Many have become friends after years of conversations. Many have helped me and our staff with both small and large jobs over the years. But within the last year or so, there has been an explosive increase in the number of times I’ve felt unsafe during an interaction with a stranger in need of support that I’m not qualified in any capacity to offer. People have started avoiding patio seating as a result. People frequently tell me that coming downtown feels much different than it once did. Again, we do not have a solution. We will not leave downtown—that is not a solution. We love this town. We love our corner. And I don’t believe for a second that nothing can be done to help more people in need. So what do we do? I swear to God we try every day, as best we can. I don’t mean to complain. This is not a complaint. It’s simply a question.”
SafeD Athens understands these concerns. For several years, we have collected and analyzed local, state, and federal data to better understand the challenges facing both individuals experiencing chronic homelessness and the broader community. That research led us to strongly support the Mental Health Treatment Housing facility now under construction at Advantage Behavioral Health Systems because we believe long-term treatment—not simply crisis response—is essential to lasting recovery.
As the new Mayor and Commission establish their priorities, we urge them to recognize that the current approach is not sustainable. Athens should continue investing in treatment and recovery for its own residents while working with neighboring counties, state agencies, and federal partners to build a stronger regional behavioral health network. Expanding services throughout Georgia—not concentrating them in Athens—will produce better outcomes for those in crisis while reducing the burden placed on a single community.
At the same time, local government has a responsibility to protect public safety. That includes adopting and enforcing policies that address aggressive panhandling, dangerous public behavior, chronic encampments in inappropriate locations, and other activities that threaten the safety of residents, visitors, businesses, and the unsheltered individuals themselves. Compassion and accountability are not competing values; they are both necessary for an effective response.
The presentation above summarizes the data supporting these conclusions and outlines immediate policy recommendations. We encourage the Mayor and Commission to use these findings as the foundation for meaningful action. Athens has an opportunity to become a leader in evidence-based mental health treatment and regional collaboration—but doing so will require acknowledging the limits of our local capacity, prioritizing Athens-Clarke County residents for scarce local treatment resources, strengthening public safety, and working with the State of Georgia to build a decentralized behavioral health system that better serves communities across the state.