Cullman’s capacity for behavioral health treatment got a boost Monday with the formal opening of a newly expanded and renovated local facility for substance abuse and mental health care provider WellStone.

Located along Commerce Avenue in north Cullman near the interchange between Alabama Highway 157 and I-65, the expanded WellStone center sports a new look inside and out while allowing “key community programs including child/adolescent mobile crisis teams, outreach services and primary care” to operate out of the facility, the Huntsville-based nonprofit said in a release.

Since merging with Mental Healthcare of Cullman in 2017, WellStone has served Cullman County and nearby communities as a provider of mental health services covering a portion of Region 1 of the Alabama Department of Mental Health (ADMH), an area that includes 13 north Alabama counties. In all, ADMH maintains five distinct mental health coverage regions across the state.

The center also serves as a responding service for 988 suicide and crisis lifeline calls in the Cullman area, a phone-based response outreach that functions as “the mental health and substance abuse version of 911,” according to WellStone development director Karen Petersen.

“WellStone is always planning and preparing for the future needs of Cullman County, and the extra space has a key role to play in providing coordinated easily accessible mental health and addiction care” too the community,” the nonprofit said in its release.

Between its Madison County and Cullman County locations, WellStone currently maintains a staff of almost 500 professionals, while serving more than 14,000 people of all ages, Petersen said. In keeping with its mission of offering behavioral health care to residents across Region 1, patients come to each facility not only from Cullman or Huntsville, but from communities in other Alabama counties as well.