FLORENCE — South Carolina’s first regional behavioral health and crisis intervention facility took its first step toward completion May 22 as the last iron beam soared into place to complete the iron framing.

State, city and health care leaders participated in the topping out ceremony for the MUSC Jean and Hugh K. Leatherman Behavioral Care Pavilion in Florence. The behavorial health and crisis intervention is scheduled to open in October 2025.

The development of regional behavioral health centers was one of the late Sen. Hugh Leatherman’s final actions to move South Carolina forward. Leatherman served in the state senate for 41 years. He died on Nov. 12, 2021.

Leatherman’s widow, Jean, said her family is proud of the cooperation between the state, McLeod Health, MUSC and the city of Florence that was instrumental in making this facility happen.

They also are proud of the structural progress that has been made and recognized at the topping out ceremony.

“It was his last legislative request,” she said in an interview following the ceremony. “He pretty much activated everybody on the team that is here to make sure this happened in the future.”

The MUSC Jean and Hugh K. Leatherman Behavioral Health Pavilion reflects that his legacy in the state senate continues to make South Carolina a better place to live, she said.

Jean and Hugh Leatherman were great leaders for South Carolina, Gov. Henry McMaster said in his speech at the topping out ceremony.

“This day is an example of what we can do when you have a little bit of vision and a little bit of determination,” McMaster said. “Our state is full of those things.”

A recent study, McMaster said, showed our health delivery system was the most fragmented and inefficient in the United States today.

No one person is to blame for that. It happened over time, he said, adding state officials are working to improve the efficiency of health care.

The Florence-based regional behavioral center will be a model for similar facilities throughout the state and across the United States, McMaster said.

South Carolina officials announced plans for the Florence-based behavioral health hospital and crisis intervention services in June 2023.

The South Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, Medical University of South Carolina and McLeod Health led the public-private collaboration to address the need for mental health services in the 10-county Pee Dee region.

The City of Florence is providing $5 million of the $100 million needed to build the center.

Razing the former MUSC Florence Medical Center Building on South Dargan Street in Florence was the first construction project’s first phase.

How do it the project get started?

McMaster acknowledged the state’s mental health crisis in his 2022 State of the State address. He directed Kerr and his Health and Human Services department to investigate.

After they found inadequate resources in schools and a fragmented crisis service system, the state legislature appropriated $65 million to address the problem, and a state task force took up the cause.

The Pee Dee facility is among the first fruits of that effort.

The effort started in the Pee Dee because the Florence area lacked mental health services. There was only one mental health bed for every 7,000 people in the Pee Dee, compared to 1 for 2,600 in the rest of the state.

At the May 22 topping out ceremony, state Director of the Department of Health and Human Services Robby Kerr called the behavioral centers construction a historic event.

The state has invested $100 million, and the city of Florence has contributed $5 million to build the facility, Kerr said.

“It’s historic because we have the collaboration of multiple health care systems, multiple universities and state agencies,” Kerr said. “It’s unheard of, unfortunately, in the state of South Carolina.”

The need for the Florence-based behavioral health center and those that will follow is great.

South Carolina’s mental health facility to resident ratio is three times the national average.

“That’s the worst among our peers in Southern states,” Kerr said.

The same report, Kerr said, confirmed South Carolina’s health care structure is the most fragmented in the U.S.

“It was leading to our poor outcomes,” Kerr added.

The MUSC Leatherman Behavioral Health Pavilion is the first step for the state to make health care more efficient in the state, Kerr said.

McLeod Health CEO/President Donna Isgett said the Florence facility will bring together crisis intervention care, outpatient care and rapid assessment of mental health issues.

About a third of the people suffer from some type of behavioral health issue, Isgett said.

“It has really skyrocketed since COVID,” she said. “In the past, we had some capacity here, but not nearly enough today.”

Medical University of South Carolina President David J. Cole said the topping out ceremony was a critical mile marker in a statewide effort to create a nation-leading mental health care system for South Carolina.

“It is a tangible step to change the current behavioral health reality and challenges so many of our citizens face daily. Starting with the lack of access to and continuity of care provided,” Cole said.

The Leatherman Behavioral Health Care Pavilion will improve the mental health of residents in the Pee Dee, Cole said.

Others chip in

Francis Marion University is part of the collaboration. It offers a psychiatric nurse practitioner program and launched a doctorate of psychology degree program in January.

The Jean and Hugh Leatherman Regional Behavior Center will create approximately 250 jobs in Florence. The Francis Marion University programs will provide the professionals to fill those positions.

Francis Marion University President Fred Carter said the behavioral health center will be a great employment location for those in its psychiatric nurse practitioner program and the new doctorate of psychology degree program.