College Station city council directs staff to survey interest in recruiting a psychiatric hospital

This podcast contains comments from the January 15, 2026 College Station city council meeting.Since June 2020, there has not been a psychiatric hospital serving the Brazos Valley.That need was brought up at the last College Station city council meeting.Councilmembers directed staff to contact officials in Bryan, Brazos County, and Texas A&M to possibly partner to address the lack of mental health services.Councilwoman Melissa McIlhaney initiated the subject during the police chief's presentation on how CSPD deals with people having mental health issues.The council learned CSPD has a 20 member crisis intervention team, and those members are further trained as mental health peace officers who respond to the more unique or challenging calls.All CSPD officers receive crisis intervention training while in the police academy. Councilmembers were told the majority of calls involving who the chief described as "mental health consumers" are taken by patrol officers.Click HERE to read and download presentation materials from the College Station police chief at the January 8, 2026 city council meeting.City manager Bryan Woods recalled a similar joint effort was attempted after the only psychiatric hospital in Brazos Valley, located in College Station, closed more than five years ago.Councilman Bob Yancy, who also serves on the board of the Brazos County health district, says mental health services continues to be at the top of their community needs survey.