Denver Now Routing 911 Calls About Mental Health Issues Away From Cops, Towards Trained Health Professionals

Culture

from the saving-lives-by-limiting-state-violence dept

Sending out armed law enforcement officers to handle mental health crises has often been a bad idea. Situations that require compassion, de-escalation, and nuance are far too often greeted with force, more force, and deadly force. Since there’s always “excited delirium” to excuse the deaths caused by officers ill-equipped to deal with mental health issues, very little has changed. Until now.

Recently, there has been a nationwide uprising against police brutality and the senseless killing of unarmed citizens by law enforcement officers. Legislators are actively pursuing reform efforts and finally suggesting some things cops just aren’t trained to do well should be handled by others who can handle them better. Some police officials believe this is “defunding.” But it isn’t. It’s just taking money being used badly and rerouting it to programs and personnel who are specifically trained to work with people suffering from mental health issues.

A lot of city lawmakers are talking about shifting resources away from the “guys with guns” approach that has seen a great many people in need of health intervention “assisted” to death by police officers. The city of Denver is actually doing something about it. Denver’s Support Team Assistance Response (STAR) — launched four days after George Floyd-related protests began in Denver — sends out health professionals and paramedics to respond to 911 calls about people behaving erratically.

Since its launch June 1, the STAR van has responded to more than 350 calls, replacing police in matters that don’t threaten public safety and are often connected to unmet mental or physical needs. The goal is to connect people who pose no danger with services and resources while freeing up police to respond to other calls. The team, which is not armed, has not called police for backup, [Carleigh] Sailon said.

This limits the number of interactions involving weapons with the power to maim or kill. This makes it a program that saves lives — not only because the STAR team gets people the help they need, but because it prevents situations from escalating to the point where jailing or force deployment (or both) seem to be the only options. This new task force is all that much more important since so many Denver residents appear to feel 911 is just a city customer service line.

The team has responded to an indecent exposure call that turned out to be a woman changing clothes in an alley because she was unhoused and had no other private place to go. They’ve been called out to a trespassing call for a man who was setting up a tent near someone’s home. They’ve helped people experiencing suicidal thoughts, people slumped against a fence, people simply acting strange.

The STAR team only handles a small percentage of the city’s 911 calls. Most are still handled by law enforcement. But it does free up police resources to handle situations requiring their presence, rather than asking under-trained officers to handle everything residents ask them to handle because they don’t know who else to ask.

Police are always talking about working smarter. But they rarely seem to recognize their own shortcomings could be addressed by others who won’t take an approach that ends in death, arrest, or injury. They should embrace programs like these that allow them to pursue actual criminals, rather than treating people who are victims of mental illness, homelessness, or suicidal thoughts like criminals because that’s how they’re trained to treat everyone.

Filed Under: 911, denver, mental health