The Ames City Council approved emergency funds for the Richmond Center last Tuesday.

The Story County Richmond Center, 125 S. 3rd St. Suite 200, cq provides mental health services to patients. The center was in danger of closing and was not expected to remain open past the end of November without immediate funding.

“We have a lot of people with chronic mental illnesses and the police and mental health task force see them every day to try to find help for them,” said Ames’ assistant city manager Sheila Lundt, who presented the report on the Richmond Center. “We’re talking about hundreds of people, and so I think this is important.”

The Richmond Center asked for $20,000 from the city to help pay for nursing services and $25,000 in forgivable loans for technology upgrades.

A total of $178,000 from the city of Ames, United Way, Story County and the Mary Greeley Medical Center was asked for by the center.

The United Way Board of Story County voted on Nov. 20 to provide an additional $44,500 for the Richmond Center.

The funds will be used to update technology to track patient information, stabilize payroll for center employees, improve nursing services and hire a new psychiatrist to replace the center’s psychiatrist who left last spring.

Lundt said because the Richmond Center has been running low on funds, there is little chance a patient will be admitted to the center unless an individual has insurance or ability to pay.

“When a person has a chronic mental illness it is very difficult for them to hold down a job, so many of them are in a situation where Medicaid is the only option they have,” Lundt said. “In many cases Medicaid patients just aren’t accepted or are accepted in smaller numbers.”