View full sizeNorthcoast Behavioral facility in Cleveland.CLEVELAND, Ohio MetroHealth System will take over and demolish the nearly vacant 10-story Northcoast Behavioral Healthcare facility next to its main campus.

The plan, which will be approved as part of Ohio’s budget, provides the county hospital with $3.4 million from state coffers to demolish the 1920s-era facility. In the end, MetroHealth will have 3.88 acres added to its now-landlocked campus on Cleveland’s near West Side.

“It gives us an open footprint,” said MetroHealth’s Tom Goins, vice president of facilities and construction.

The health system does not yet have plans for the property, which Goins said he hopes will be razed by this time next year.

Plans to close the aging Northcoast facility have been under consideration for years. In February, Ohio’s Department of Mental Health announced that it would shutter the 100-bed Northcoast and move the patients, many of whom were sent there from the court system after being diagnosed with mental illness.

Local political leaders had fought for a new facility in Cuyahoga County to replace Northcoast. However, state lawmakers said they expected to save $4 million in the first year by relocating patients to the existing Northfield campus of Northcoast Behavioral Healthcare at 1756 Sagamore Road in Summit County.

The last patients left the building June 23, Ohio Department of Mental Health spokeswoman Trudy Sharp said.

The state has begun operating a shuttle service for families during visiting hours at the Northfield campus. The shuttles will provide round trips daily between 3:30 and 9 p.m. from Tower City Center and Southgate Transit Center at 5400 Warrensville Road. For more information, call Northcoast Behavioral Healthcare at 330-467-7131.

stribble@plaind.com, 216-999-4255

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