Mike Wolanin | The Republic Bartholomew County Commissioner Tony London gives a speech during an open house for the new Bartholomew County Highway Garage in Columbus, Ind., Thursday, April 21, 2022.
Bartholomew County Commissioners Chairman Tony London has been nominated to serve on the 12-member Centerstone of Indiana board of directors.
With nearly 30 facilities located throughout the Hoosier State, Centerstone is made up of several behavioral health centers that provide mental health care, addictions recovery, medical care and pharmacy services.
If current board members approve London’s nomination during the next Centerstone board meeting on Oct. 4, London will serve a three-year term that expires on Sept. 18, 2026. The meetings are held every two months and usually available to board members through Zoom video conferencing.
“The whole point is to have more local representation in the decision-making realm of Centerstone,” London said.
Bartholomew County is already represented on the board by Doug Leonard, the former president and CEO of Columbus Regional Health and the Indiana Hospital Association. Leonard also served as executive director of the Alliance for Substance Abuse Progress in Bartholomew County from 2019 to 2021.
London’s nomination comes several months after the Indiana General Assembly passed a new law allowing counties served by organizations like Centerstone to nominate a board member. Currently, Centerstone has nearly 30 facilities operating in several of Indiana’s 92 counties.
At times, Bartholomew County government has experienced a rocky relationship with the behavioral health center. In 2018, the county increased the amount it provides Centerstone from $590,039 to $613,641 to serve the indigent.
But at the time, county council attorney Chris Monroe chided Centerstone leaders for not providing required annual reports showing how local tax funds were spent in the Columbus area. A number of council members expressed dissatisfaction when submitted reports provided collective statistics on all Indiana facilities – not just Bartholomew County.
In response, a Centerstone official said statistics are gathered and analyzed at the state level and often cannot be broken down to a localized level.
During that same meeting in 2018, former council member Laura DeDomenic said she was informed that Centerstone was increasingly sending uninsured patients to Family Service, Inc., which DeDomenic described as a struggling nonprofit that receives no tax support. Centerstone officials responded that should not be the practice at their organization.
In terms of the relationship between Centerstone and county government today, “there is still a little bit of anxiety there,” Kleinhenz said. “But I think they are now meeting their requirements.”
Centerstone is now receiving almost $800,000 annually from the county for indigent care. Kleinhenz said he feels the nonprofit is doing a good job for their constituency.
“I know it’s easy to be unhappy with Centerstone, but it’s easy to be unhappy with mental illness,” Kleinhenz said. “And there is no easy solution or easy fix. Our objective is to elevate the awareness and level of service.”
As a member of the Indiana board, London said he will seek more local representation in the decision-making realm of Centerstone.
