Helen Ross Mcnabb Center, Inc.

Helen Ross McNabb Center, Inc., doing business as Mcnabb Center, is a Knoxville, Tennessee–based nonprofit organization that acts as a prime recipient on federal grants and as a sub-recipient on pass-through funding from state agencies, delivering community behavioral health and social services across 25 East Tennessee counties. The organization operates exclusively in the federal grant space — no federal contracts — and functions as a regional health and social services provider anchored by Continuum of Care (CoC) housing assistance, opioid recovery and medication-assisted treatment, crisis stabilization, transitional housing for domestic violence survivors, workforce development, and juvenile justice reentry services.

McNabb Center holds 154 total awards across 16 federal agencies, with the vast majority flowing through federal grant programs rather than direct contracting vehicles. The organization operates as prime recipient on 49 awards (32%) and as a sub-recipient on 105 awards (68%), reflecting its role as both a direct federal grantee and a service delivery partner within state-administered federal programs. The top five customer agencies by award count account for 67% of the award portfolio: the Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs (35 awards for victims of crime services), the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA, 20 and 17 awards across different program lines), the Department of Housing and Urban Development's Continuum of Care Program (19 awards), and the Administration for Children and Families (12 awards). Combined dollars obligated across all awards total $107.3 million.

Capability depth centers on behavioral health intervention and social determinant services. McNabb Center holds multiple prime grants spanning homelessness and housing, opioid crisis response, intimate partner violence support, and youth mental health. Representative prime awards include a $612,613 HUD Continuum of Care Program grant (CFDA 14.267) effective May 2026 through April 2027 for permanent supportive housing and rapid rehousing in Knoxville; a $500,000 Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women Transitional Housing Assistance grant (CFDA 16.736) for 11 program-owned transitional housing residences serving domestic violence survivors, running October 2025 through September 2028; and a $700,000 OVW Rural Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Assistance grant (CFDA 16.589) providing sexual assault forensic examination and victim services across rural East Tennessee, October 2025 through September 2028. McNabb Center also holds a $825,000 Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Assistance Second Chance Act Reentry Initiative grant (CFDA 16.812) supporting cross-system collaboration between justice and behavioral health agencies to serve 750 youth over three years, and a $900,000 Appalachian Regional Commission grant (CFDA 23.002) for workforce training initiatives running January 2025 through December 2027. SAMHSA funded a $1.7 million Comprehensive Opioid Recovery Centers grant addressing the opioid epidemic in Appalachian Tennessee through medication-assisted treatment and recovery support, with multi-year authority running through September 2027; and a five-year Youth and Family Tree grant providing substance use and co-occurring disorder treatment to transitional-age youth.

Sub-recipient activity is predominantly flow-through, with McNabb Center receiving pass-through subawards from Tennessee state agencies—the Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services, Department of Health, Department of Education, Department of Finance and Administration, and East Tennessee State University. These sub-awards fund delivery of adult and adolescent substance use treatment, first-episode psychosis intervention, medication-assisted treatment, prevention services, home visiting, school-based mental health, victim services, and jail reentry programming across multiple SAMHSA, HHS, and DOJ programs. The portfolio includes multiple recurring sub-awards under state behavioral health contracts, Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) services, National School Lunch Program reimbursements, and Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) funding.

Activity has grown substantially year over year—22 awards in 2022 to 34 in 2025—though only 6 awards face ultimate completion within the next 24 months, indicating stable multi-year funding commitments. McNabb Center competes as an open-market nonprofit grantee without SBA designations and does not hold federal contracts or contract vehicles; its entire federal footprint flows through competitive and formula grant programs administered by HUD, DOJ, SAMHSA, the Appalachian Regional Commission, and pass-through state agencies. The organization's federal strategy is grounded in regional social determinant and behavioral health needs rather than contracting market positioning, with service delivery concentrated in Knox County and surrounding rural East Tennessee counties where it operates as the largest community mental health provider in the region.