Tucson: Crisis Response Teams

Location

• City: Tucson, Arizona
• Population Size: 548,073
• Jurisdiction Size: 226.71 sq miles

Intercept

• 1 – Co-responder teams
• 0-Tucson/ Arizona are looking into non-police-based responses for the future

CIT (Crisis Intervention Training) Requirements

• Immersion model
• 40 hours of training
• Co-responders attend CIT with officers

Model Components

• Staffing Structure
  • Six years ago, Chief of Police started the program with a sergeant and 2 officers-self funded by PD
  • Started with a task force model focused on MH (Court ordered treatment) – centralized
  • Has crisis center- none of this stuff would work without the 24-hour treatment center option (takes voluntary and involuntary)
  • Homeless outreach team- new in the past few months
  • All teams housed in the same program- all collaborative- try to do a holistic approach
  • Have a full spectrum of outreach workers and co-responders that interact
  • 3 units/sergeants 21 officers/ 11-12 co-responders currently
  • Clinical co-responders
  • Deflection model has peers that co-respond with deflection officers
  • Adding 8 more social workers embedded in PD
  • Peers trained in housing first model respond with homeless outreach officers
  • Peers:
    • Blend of both CPS and lived experience
    • All peers are CPS.
    • Started with all clinical co-responders, moved to peers- completely different experience in terms of supervising, training, etc.
    • Program Highlights
    • Mental Health Support Team (MHST)
  • Co-responder program pairs MHST officers with mental health clinicians
  • Proactively and compassionately connects people who have mental health needs to services before, during, and after a crisis
  • Crisis Mobile Teams (CMT)
  • Work in tandem with the crisis line to provide continuous access to services
  • Crisis Response Center (CRC)
  • Provides 24/7 emergency psychiatric and substance addiction treatment services for both adults and youth
  • Multi-tiered training is open to all levels of law enforcement, mental health workers, call takers and dispatchers, emergency medical technicians, paramedics, and firefighters.
  • Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) and basic crisis mitigation and management training for all officers; training is also open to the community
  • Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training for officers on a voluntary basis
  • Advanced training for specialized units including MHST and Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) Negotiators
  •  
• Staff Training/Qualifications
  • All co-responders get a 1-week orientation course- go to the academy, trained on police radio, firearms, driving and go through 40-hour CIT training with officers
  • Regardless of employment source
• Dispatch Structure
  • Do a lot of training and team building with co-responders and cops (CIT, MH etc.)
  • Warm-line transfer to a crisis line- if a 911 call comes in, they can warm-line transfer to a crisis line to avoid police involvement. Dispatch will stay on the line for a bit to make sure that it doesn’t become emergent. Calls can flow back and forth between 911 and crisis.
  • 911 can divert calls to co-responders and send CIT officers to crisis calls
  • Were about to embed 3 crisis line workers into police communications-put on hold due to COVID
  • Can help triage what is appropriate for diversion up stream
  • Crisis line can dispatch mobile acute crisis teams who can then request law enforcement if they feel it is necessary

Operating Structure

• • Operations
    • Co-responders at all levels go to crisis real time calls but have a large focus on wrap around follow-up with co-responders.
    • Try to proactively follow up with individuals before the next crisis call
    • Follow-up with top 100 individuals who were arrested and have a MH court order
    • 24/7 On Demand Treatment Center
    • Operation is funded through MCO, mostly Medicaid
    • Voluntary, involuntary, adult, juveniles
    • 65% of drop-offs are voluntary
    • No wrong door policy for law enforcement- Dr. Balfour runs the CRC
    • ER hospital and CRC are connected/in the same place
    • Follow-up
    • Can refer cases for deeper follow-up with detectives
    • Prioritize cases that involve danger to others
    • Same process with detectives as LA
    • A critical part of the program and the buy-in for the PD/ justification for the tea
  • Funding Mechanisms
    • Clinical co-responders funded by MCO (Arizona Complete Health Centene)
    • Broke down a team that was responding and used funding to embed them in the PD
    • Deflection model – Bureau of Justice Assistance grant funded- have peers that co-respond with deflection officers
    • Peers trained in housing first model. County initiative, grant and self-funded – respond with homeless outreach team officers
    • City has agreed to self-fund 8 more social workers to be embedded in the PD
    • Currently applying for a few more grants. Big push to find long term sustainable funding.
    • Medicaid expansion state so some of this work is funded through that already
    • 24/7 On-Demand Treatment Center- funded through a blend model, building is funded through a bond (voter initiative)
  • MOUs/Contracting
    • Unknown
  • Management Structure
    • All co-responders come from different providers
    • Blend of different types of employees
    • Substance deflection program-PD employees
    • 8 new social workers- PD employees
  • Supplies/Equipment
    • Plain clothes-everyone
    • Drive unmarked police cars
    • All co-responders have company vehicles as well

Data Systems & Collection

• Data Systems:
  • Co-responders have their own laptops on their own servers. They have their own data and warehouse
  • Some data goes back and forth and some doesn’t
  • Ton of data agreements between entities
  • A lot of MOUs and data sharing agreements
  • The deflection program has releases people can sign. PD can get this info if the person signs the release
• Data Collection:
  • Something they struggle with
  • Manage jail data- one of the biggest areas of tracking
  • Jail population review committee
    • Track MH orders
    • Track uses of force in MH orders
    • Track deflection orders
    • Track recidivism for deflection program
    • Homeless engagement tracks engagement
    • Avg # engagement
    • Repeat engagement
    • Each program is a little bit different
• Highlighted Statistics/Outcomes:
  • 1200 deflections in the past year and a half. Only 30 repeat customers

Key Takeaways

• Peers can be effectively used in co-responder programs
• Having a variety of providers for co-responders can work well
• No wrong door to accessing care