Lehigh County Detox Center Grand Opening Monday

After years of planning, Lehigh County is set to celebrate with a grand opening of the new residential drug treatment center in Salisbury Township.

A group of VIPs, including former drug czar Barry McCaffrey, will be on hand for a ribbon-cutting at 11 a.m. Monday at the Lehigh County Center for Recovery, which will be enable about 700 people a year with drug and alcohol problems to get treatment closer to home.

The facility at 1620 Riverside Drive will be run as a partnership between Lehigh County and CRC Health Group’s White Deer Run division.

According to a news release, the facility, which is state-funded, has been licensed by state authorities and will be an adult co-ed, inpatient, detoxification, rehabilitation and dual diagnosis program. 

"Pennsylvania has made great strides but still has some 900,000 people who need but do not receive drug and alcohol treatment" according to Health and Human Services and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, McCaffrey said in the prepared release. "The public-private partnership with Lehigh County is an outstanding strategy to address the treatment gap and restore people to productive lives."

Lehigh County Executive Bill Hansell thanked the state legislature for its "foresight in providing the crucial funding."