Trinity Services opens Joliet community health center

Trinity Services recently opened a Community Health Center in Joliet, which focuses primarily on mental health services.

But its long-range goal is to become a certified community health center, which would include having a nurse onsite, according to Bonnie Hassan, director of outpatient services at the New Lenox-based Trinity Services.

“We could do some primary care screening and connect people to primary care providers in the community,” Hassan said. “That was part of the reason why we consolidated all these services in the same building; it’s required to have the certification. So doing all this moves us closer to this goal.”

Hassan also said in a news release from Trinity Services, “We are also in the process of obtaining a substance use license that will allow us to provide outpatient care on multiple levels.”

Trinity Services bought the community health center building at 2000 Glenwood Ave. in Joliet approximately 18 months ago and began moving some services – such as The Living Room – into the building as early as May 2024, Hassan said.

The Living Room is an Illinois Department of Human Services program that gives adults 24-hour, 365-day access to free emergency mental health care.

“We recognized a need for an alternative place for people to go when experiencing a mental health related crisis,” Hassan previously said. “Often people do not know where to go for assistance and end up in the emergency room or contacting first responders. The Living Room is an alternative for people who do not need those higher levels of care.”

Community Health Center programs

Because of the abundant space, Trinity Services then moved other programs – scattered at various locations – into the community health center.

if someone comes in with no insurance and no ability to pay for services, we are still going to serve them."

—  Bonnie Hassan, director of outpatient services at the New Lenox-based Trinity Services

“For a long time, we have wanted a place where people can come and receive multiple levels of care and take advantage of many different services, all in one convenient location,” Hassan said in the release.

According to Hassan, these programs include:

Family Counseling Center: The center offers mental health therapy for children, adolescents and adults through individual and group sessions.

Homeless support and community support teams: These teams support services to people referred to Trinity Services through Will County Continuum of Care.

Pathways to Success: This Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services program is for Medicaid-enrolled children under the age of 21 in Illinois with “complex behavioral health needs” who could benefit from additional home and community-based services, according to the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services website.

Mobile Crisis Response Teams: These teams respond to 988 calls and mental health crises 24/7 anywhere in the community. A state grant funds the teams, which are comprised of mental health professionals paired with people with lived experience. The service area is Will County and part of suburban Cook County (Orland Township, Worth Township and Palos Township).

“People can either talk to our staff on the phone, walk into one of the mobile crisis response team sites or we can meet in the community – at people’s homes, public places, schools, etc.,” Hassan said.

Hassan said Trinity Services also provides mental health education and suicide prevention training for first responders.

Additionally, the Will-Grundy chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness is still onsite.

“NAMI has an office in both of our Living Room programs and have been a wonderful partner,” Hassan said. ”They offer groups out of our sites and will help to offer resources to the guests and their families,”

Future goals include adding a psychiatric service and a Living Room-type program for adolescents, Hassan said.

The teen program would not run around-the-clock or include overnight stays as The Living Room program does, she added.

“But teens who are struggling with something could have walk-in access to a person who can help them,” Hassan said.

Immediate benefits

The community health center is accessible is more than one way.

For instance, connecting people with more than one need is often as simple as walking them down the hall to the next service, introducing them to the right person and explaining the need, Hassan said.

And with being located near Saint Joseph Medical Center in Joliet and a bus route, makes it easier “for people to find us,” Hassan said.

With this new space, Trinity Services has more than doubled its therapy rooms, from “six or seven” to 15, Hassan said. All forms of insurance are accepted and a sliding scale is available for people without insurance, which state grant funds offset, she said.

“So if someone comes in with no insurance and no ability to pay for services, we are still going to serve them,” Hassan said.

The community health center is made possible by a Will County American Rescue Plan Act Grant, according to the release.

For more information, call 815-485-6197 or visit trinityservices.org.