compelling quotes
“BCR should become a permanent 24/7 program with appropriate capacity, clinical oversight, comprehensive training, and continuous quality improvement processes, including enhanced data-collection and reporting capabilities. BCR should develop relationships with COPE and other mental health services to better serve individuals experiencing behavioral health issues, and BCR should cross-train with MECC, MPD, EMS, and Fire.” Source
“They also reported that the increased staff, supplies, and vehicles—especially the newer branded STAR vans—have increased awareness of the program and its impact on those it serves” Source
"First, civilian crisis response services overlap and brush up against not only the mandates and activities of policing, but also (at minimum) emergency paramedicine and social work. How these organisations are included in broader interorganisational structures – and how they distinguish themselves from other organisations based on what is inside of, and beyond, their mission – will help to determine the basis for organisational legitimacy, the civilian crisis responder’s professional identity, and the institutional ethos that shapes priorities, resourcing, and responses in their day-to-day work." Source
"Each of these [professional] Codes elaborates an approach to improving human wellbeing, but clearly focus on different kinds of harms, which in turn call for different kinds of remedies. While police focus on protection of people from other people (and with an underlying duty to the law), social work (broadly speaking) focuses on the meeting of human needs, especially the needs of the vulnerable (and addressing the structural conditions that create vulnerability). EMS practitioners focus on the conservation of life in emergency situations, without a secondary focus on either law or addressing structural conditions...these general principles articulated by national organisations representing workers in each sector illuminate meaningful differences between each profession’s orientation to their work, the people they serve and their professional identities. As the civilian-led crisis response field grows and organisations become increasingly similar, the organisational ethos for crisis response services will determine what harms, and means to address those harms, are central to the missions of those services." Source
"In terms of co-responder challenges, staff described lack of clear tri-aging, policy and procedures and confusion within police servicesabout the role of the co-responder team, resulting in underutiliza-tion of the service (Bailey et al., 2018). Similar to the CIT model, cultural and values clashes and differences in mandate from health -care workers and police officers within teams was reported” Source
"Service users in one study suggested that the use of unmarked police cars and non-uniformed officers would further reduce distress and embarrassment." Source
"Service users also reported a preference for un-marked vehicles and plainclothes officers in co- response models." Source
“Officers in particular struggled with MCAT uniforms, which one officer described as ‘a halfway-police officer uniform’” Source
"The team explored their initial design directions in a series of focus groups with LA residents, trusted messengers, and county and mental health workers to better understand the impact of the potential messaging and visuals." Source
"When asked specific questions about what types of uniforms or other visual signs of affiliation with the PSR should be considered, the most popular response was “colored shirts.” Some respondents thought that uniforms could be helpful if they clearly distinguished them from other first responders, while sirens and flashing lights should be avoided." Source
“International Crisis Response Association (ICRA), has been established to help guide an increasingly professional sphere of practice and to support crisis response organizations in sharing research, data, lessons, policies, practices, and ideas with one another on a regular basis.” Source
"In San Antonio, Care teams of mental health workers were created to step in during student mental health crises instead of SROs." Source
"The Child Assistance, Remediation, and Evaluation (CARE) Team is a part of a Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) which helps students who are in crisis situations that might lead to emergency detainment." Source
“We are calling for local 911 Emergency Communications Centers (ECCs) to be independent and equal public safety departments equipped to tap a diverse range of responses to best match the response to each emergency. This requires removing the default to police or another system common in many communities when ECCs are housed within law enforcement or another emergency response agency....The leaders of these agencies need autonomy to address issues that affect the greater public safety mission of a jurisdiction that has proven practically and politically difficult when ECCs are in a subordinate position (usually within or to police and/or fire)” Source
"The primary challenge is more cultural than technical, since call takers often hesitate to send calls to unarmed responders when they have spent their entire careers sending calls to police." Source
“EMS, fire, and law enforcement agencies are often understaffed and overtaxed and responsible for advancing a mission and vision outside the direct scope required to effectively handle and dispatch calls for service. The current practice of tasking these other agencies with the call-taking and dispatching functions can introduce additional burdens and divert front-line and executive-level staff members’ attention from the core mission for which their agencies are responsible and should be held accountable.” Source
"Community Responders could handle calls unrelated to behavioral health needs, which might be classified as disturbances, suspicious persons, trespassing incidents, noise complaints, other quality-of-life concerns, and lower-risk neighborhood conflicts." Source
"'I like the terminology of appropriate response rather than alternative response because it shines the light on the reality that maybe these calls were never appropriate at all for police, but that was the only tool we had at the time,' Hanson said." Source
“So far, these programs rarely need to call for police backup. There have been no known major injuries of any community responder on the job so far, according to experts. And data suggests unarmed responders rarely need to call in police. In Eugene, Oregon, which has operated the Crisis Assistance Helping Out On The Streets (known locally as CAHOOTS) response team since 1989, roughly 1% of their calls end up requiring police backup, according to the organization. Albuquerque responders have asked for police in 1% of calls, as of January. In Denver, the Support Team Assisted Response (STAR) team had never called for police backup due to a safety issue as of July 2022, the most recent data available. In Durham, members of the Holistic Empathetic Assistance Response Team (HEART) reported feeling safe on 99% of calls.” Source
"Under the city’s contract with Freedom House, police dispatchers were responsible for forwarding calls to Freedom House ambulances in the neighborhoods where they operated—but police dispatchers often refused to do so. Officers believed that the ambulance driver jobs “belong[ed] to them” and were territorial with what they considered to be their jurisdiction...But police resistance was not limited to a refusal to forward calls. When Freedom House paramedics arrived at the scene, police officers could be hostile or unaccepting. John Moon recalled seeing the police dragging patients out of wrecked cars—when he and his crew tried to explain that the patient needed to be placed on a spine board with a cervical collar, the police “cuss[ed] [them] out.” In some situations, the police threatened Freedom House paramedics with arrest if they tried to intervene." Source