The state-run psychiatric hospital set to be built on 11 acres of donated land on the outskirts of southwest Wichita is expected to accept its first patients in early 2027.
The 104-bed facility at MacArthur and Meridian will serve both patients who are court ordered to receive treatment there and people charged with crimes who need to be evaluated for competency to stand trial.
The $101.5 million hospital will likely be the first project completed on a planned 77-acre behavioral health campus called OneRise that’s owned by real estate broker and investor Jeff Lange.
The hospital itself will be designed essentially as a secure correctional facility in a hospital setting with both an 8-foot interior fence and a 10-foot exterior fence surrounding the building, according to Basil Sherman, principal at Kansas City, Missouri-based Pulse Design Group, which specializes in healthcare facilities. The firm’s renderings of the hospital do not yet reflect the second perimeter fence.
At a community meeting Thursday evening, officials from Sedgwick County and the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services shared renderings of the inside and outside of the hospital and a tentative map of the surrounding behavioral health campus.