With support of the Bureau of Justice Assistance, the University of Cincinnati Center for Police Research and Policy conducted a survey of 70 law enforcement agencies within large cities between October 2023 and January 2024. A survey of 226 mid-sized agencies who pledged to participate in the One Mind Campaign of the International Association of Chief’s of Police (IACP) was conducted between April and June of 2024 and yielded 44 completed surveys.
If you are interested in learning more about, or visiting agencies
that have these types of initiatives, please reach out to the Law
Enforcement-Mental Health Support Center by selecting the ‘Request Free
Support’ button on the center’s
website.
Agencies were provided the definition of
community responder programs as follows: “Community Responder Programs
are mobile teams of behavioral health, disability, or social service
staff that respond alone or in partnership with medical professionals
(e.g., paramedics, nurses, EMTs) to behavioral health- and
disability-related 911 calls for service that do not directly involve
law enforcement. They may also respond to other types of calls (e.g.,
from 24-hour crisis lines, referrals from law enforcement).” No other
program definitions were provided within the survey.
Below are additional definitions of the other types of response models that were included in the survey:
Crisis Intervention Team:
A team of law enforcement
officers who have received specialized training on how to identify
people with mental health needs and respond to people who are
experiencing behavioral health crises.
Police-Mental Health Co-Responder Team:
Teams of law
enforcement officers paired with behavioral health staff to respond to
people who are experiencing behavioral health crises. The structure of
these teams may vary including the type of calls they respond to, the
types of behavioral health staff they deploy (e.g., peers, social
workers), and whether the officer and the clinician respond to scenes
together or separately, or whether the clinician is available
virtually.
Pre-Arrest Diversion:
Programs that allow law enforcement
officers to use their discretion at point of contact to connect people
to community-based treatment and services, instead of an arrest, when
they would have otherwise been criminally charged.
Homeless Outreach Team:
A team of professionals, which may
include law enforcement officers, behavioral health staff, peers, and
others who engage people experiencing homelessness and respond to
homelessness-related calls for service to connect people to housing and
other supports.
Law Enforcement-Based Case Management Services:
Programs
that partner law enforcement officers with behavioral health
professionals to identify and provide case management services to people
with serious mental illnesses or other chronic behavioral health
conditions who come into frequent contact with police and emergency
services.
Veterans Response Team:
A team of law enforcement officers
who respond to scenes where people who are veterans are experiencing a
behavioral health crisis. These teams, which sometimes include officers
who are veterans, seek to link people to appropriate treatment and
services.
Mobile Crisis Team:
A team of medical professionals (e.g.,
paramedics, emergency medical technicians) who typically respond in
pairs to behavioral health crisis situations in the community and
provide on-scene assessments to connect people to crisis care and
provide follow-up support.
EMS/Ambulance-Based Response Team:
A team of medical
professionals (e.g., paramedics, emergency medical technicians) who
provide rapid responses to behavioral health crises, including
administering immediate medical attention and linking people to
appropriate behavioral health services
Peer Response Team:
Frequent Utilizer Program:
Identifies people who have
frequent police contact and cycle in and out of jails and emergency
departments, often for minor charges and non-emergency health needs.
These programs seek to connect people to services such as case
management, coordinated care, or housing to disrupt this cycling and
reduce future encounters with law enforcement.
Crisis Stabilization Units:
Also known as crisis or
drop-off centers, Crisis Stabilization Units provide immediate,
short-term mental health care for people in behavioral health crises.
They often support people who walk-in for treatment as well as received
referrals or drop-offs from law enforcement. In this way, they can serve
as alternative to use of emergency departments or arrest for law
enforcement. The type of care they provide can vary but includes
assessment, counseling, psychiatric care, case management, and
referrals.
Other Police-Led Programs:
Programs not listed above that
use specialized law enforcement initiatives to respond to people in
crisis.
Other Community Responder Programs:
Programs not listed
above that use models that position health professionals and community
members trained in crisis response as first responders.
From October 2023 to January 2024, the
University
of Cincinnati Center for Police Research and Policy surveyed 70
large and 226 mid-size U.S. municipal law enforcement agencies. Of these
296 agencies, 105 (35 percent) completed a survey on crisis response.
The survey measures the prevalence and nature of police training,
partnerships, and programs to support crisis response, including
innovative practices in responses to people with behavioral health
conditions (including mental health and substance use) and intellectual
and developmental disabilities (IDD). One limitation of these data is
that if a survey respondent was unaware of a particular program
operating in their jurisdiction, it could lead to the under reporting of
crisis response models.
Agencies were provided the definition
of community responder programs as follows: “Community Responder
Programs are mobile teams of behavioral health, disability, or social
service staff that respond alone or in partnership with medical
professionals (e.g., paramedics, nurses, EMTs) to behavioral health- and
disability-related 911 calls for service that do not directly involve
law enforcement. They may also respond to other types of calls (e.g.,
from 24-hour crisis lines, referrals from law enforcement).” Although no
other definitions were provided during the 2024 survey, the difference
between the Community Responder Program definition and a police-led
response program is that the officer is paired with a behavioral health
professional responding to calls of people experiencing behavioral
health crises.
If you have questions, would like more
information, are aware of an initiative that is missing, or have other
corrections to suggest, please reach out to LEsupport@csg.org
If you are interested in improving how your law
enforcement agency responds to people with behavioral health needs,
intellectual and developmental disabilities, or people experiencing
homelessness then here are some resources that can help you in your
efforts: