BUTLER TWP — An increase in illegal drug use in Butler County has caused the Ellen O’Brien Gaiser Center to plan an expansion.

Linda Franiewski, the center’s executive director, said the expansion comes as the facility, which is a nonprofit drug and alcohol addiction treatment center, continues to see a “considerable” increase in the number of women applying for treatment through the center’s in-patient program.

The Gaiser Center also runs an outpatient facility on Liberty Street in Butler.

Township officials on Wednesday approved the proposed expansion at the Gaiser Center at 165 Old Plank Road.

The project will significantly expand the facility and allow it to separate male and female clients.

The expansion will allow the center to increase the number of clients it serves from 29 to 45, though Gaiser Center administrators say it’s more likely that the facility would top out at about 40 clients.

Franiewski said, the center uses one of its two buildings at the facility on Old Plank Road to house both male and female patients. The patients are separated by floors, she said, but that arrangement means the center is only able to accept eight women — a number she called inadequate.

“I think everybody knows truly what is going on in our country, not just Butler County,” Franiewski said. She said the center is dealing with a rash of heroin addictions.

The expansion would allow the center, which has 13 residential rooms, to add 14 more.