ALLENTOWN, Pa. – A special committee of the Allentown City Council met Wednesday night to discuss the future implementation of a co-responder public safety model for responding to emergency calls involving mental health issues.
On March 20, the City Council voted to establish a task force to provide a framework for understanding, implementing, and evaluating a joint responder public safety model.
The committee was established after the council had a number of discussions on the topic dating back to July 2020.
In collaboration with Police Chief Charles Roca, this committee will review current administrative policies, consider existing models, gather information on such public safety models, develop options for moving forward, and Its mission is to develop performance indicators to evaluate effectiveness.
The new committee is made up of City Council members Ce-Ce Gerlach, Santo Napoli, and Ed Zucal.
Roca told the commission Wednesday that the police department is working to adopt best practices.
“Since 2014, our personnel have been trained in Crisis Intervention Teams (CITs), providing de-escalation skills and other resources,” Roca said.
Roca explained that real mental health concerns may come in as noise complaints or domestic violence calls, rather than mental health calls.
Working with Pinebrook Family Answers, Roca said police currently have two community intervention specialists available to respond to mental health calls.
The city is funding these two positions.
However, Roca said the concept is to have one CIS supervisor and four CIS officers in each of the four platoons.
“These workers were able to build relationships with officers within their platoon and work with the outside community at any time,” Roca said.
He said there is a state grant that can provide about $250,000 in one-year funding for CIS workers. Roca also said there is an opportunity to extend funding as long as the program is successful.
The police chief said the addition of mental health workers will help police officers get back to work solving crimes, reducing violence, getting guns off the streets and getting illegal drugs off the streets.
“911 centers are trained to listen to potential mental health incidents, but it’s rare for someone to call in with a specific mental health issue,” Roca added. “If they (CIS officers) happen to be in the same vehicle as an officer, they can prioritize the response and contact support systems to get the person to the hospital, so they can take immediate action. can.”
“The important thing is we want to make sure this is done right and that it fits the needs of Allentown,” Roca said. “The important thing here is that it’s about communication and collaboration, and we have active partners to this end in the Pinebrook Family and His Answers.”
Gerlach, who chairs the committee, said the next meeting will be held June 5 at 6 p.m.
“I think it would be great to have the police chiefs who are actively working on this right now come in and share information and maybe ease some of the hesitations for somebody,” Gerlach said. “For me, the most important thing is data and evaluation. Without that, you won’t grow to the point where you need to prove effectiveness.”
