Balcones Heights substance abuse treatment facility opens doors to women for first time following major remodel

Lifetime Recovery has completed an $18 million renovation of its century-old Southton facility, expanding capacity and adding services the nonprofit says will bring dignity and privacy to people in treatment for substance abuse.

The remodeling and campus expansion created 154 beds and opened the program to women for the first time, officials said.

Counseling offices are more private, and the space around the building appears “peaceful and dignified,” according to alumni who toured the facility.

Hamilton Barton, an alumnus who is now the nonprofit’s chief sustainability officer, says the need for support is ongoing, “but somebody’s got to help. No money, no mission.”

Barton, who was in the program in 2012 and 2013, recalled an enclosed corridor that staff once jokingly called “skid row.