Improving Law Enforcement Officers’ Response to Children and Youth with Behavioral Health Needs: Strategies That Work Rural Behavioral Health Webinar Series September 26, 2012
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Improving Law Enforcement Officers’ Response to Children and Youth with Behavioral Health Needs: Strategies That Work Presenters: • Elaine Slaton, MSA, Owner , Slaton Associates, LLC • Timothy Denney, MS, CRC, Training Director , Northwestern Mental Health Center
Learning Objectives • Identify factors that contribute to negative outcomes when law enforcement responds to youth in mental health or emotional crisis. • Identify steps that family members, caregivers, and youth can take to facilitate positive outcomes when involved with law enforcement to address mental health issues. • Identify tips and tools for engaging law enforcement professionals in an ongoing training relationship. • Identify the key elements of a successful training model, training team, and training experience.
What Are We Talking About? • Why are police called in the first place? • How is that request ( expectation! ) communicated to the responding officer? • What tools does the responding officer bring? • What back-up does he/she have? • What options does he/she have if the person in distress in posing a danger to themselves or others? • What options does he/she have if the person in distress needs further help? • And, then what?
Who Are These Police Officers? In general, law enforcement officers: • Want to help, • Are devoted to family and community, • Are strongly connected to their peers. Salt River AZ SRO (pop 9,000) ALL are taught to Assess – Control – Resolve. ALL are guided by polices in how they respond. Bowie MD at City Fair (pop 50,000) Photos compliments of Elaine Deck, IACP Smaller and Tribal Agency Technical Assistance 10 Program
Underlying Issues for Rural & Tribal Law Enforcement SAFETY – Rural and tribal officers experience long waits for back- 1. up (consider that domestic violence calls are among the most dangerous for police and are on the increase in rural jurisdictions). ISOLATION – Rural and tribal officers and dispatchers may have 2. less access to peer support than their urban counterparts and often encounter friends and relatives in the course of their work. LIMITED ACCESS TO ONGOING TRAINING – Access to training 3. is often limited by geography and time for training is limited by department size.
Underlying Issues for Rural & Tribal Law Enforcement 4. JURISDICTIONAL CHALLENGES – Tribal law enforcement officers may face jurisdictional challenges. 5. MUTUAL MISTRUST & STIGMA – This issue exists in most communities and can be even more isolating for rural officers. 6. SMALL DEPARTMENTS – Behavioral health crises are generally time consuming, especially if they have to transport someone and wait for attention in an emergency room. For small departments with few officers, that time is critical. 7. POLICIES & MANDATES – Police response is guided by policies and mandates that may not be supportive of their efforts to de- escalate.
Underlying Issues: National Trends • Since the passage of the Community Mental Health Centers Act (CMHCA) more than 40 years ago: – Psychiatric beds reduced, – Community behavioral health services not keeping pace. • Prison and jail populations rising (privatization has resulted in growing number of beds that need to be filled). • Nuisance offenses increasingly prosecuted. • These trends have led to a growing jail, prison, and juvenile justice detention populations with significantly disproportionate number of inmates with mental illness. – (IACP National Policy Summit: Building Safer Communities: Improving Police Response to Persons with Mental Illness, 2009)
Strategies: CCRTS C - Communication C - Collaboration in policy development, problem solving, service planning, and crisis response; e.g., Multi-disciplinary Response Teams R - Relationships T - Training, tools, and resources for law enforcement; e.g., crisis intervention team, eCPR, Mental Health First Aide S - Services to prevent and respond to crisis
Specific Steps for Youth and Their Families Engaged with Law Enforcement Officers 1. Be prepared – Prepare your child before it happens. – Get to know local police officers and foster positive relationships. 2. Effectively communicate the facts – Who is involved. – Where they are located. – Any weapons that may be accessible. – Relevant information: diagnosis, medication, anticipated behaviors. – De-escalation strategies known to work, and approaches, such as touching, that are known to further upset your child or youth. 3. Stay calm and focused on safe resolution
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Mental Health First Aid for Law Enforcement • Purpose: Increase the ability of law enforcement and correctional professionals to avoid escalating mental health crises, and de-escalate crises when the arise in their work. • Intended audience: Police officers, deputies, correctional staff, and probation agents. • Setting: Rural and frontier counties in NW Minnesota.
The Training Need • As the local system became more consumer-driven, coordinated, culturally-responsive and community- based, the need to expand training to our first responders became obvious. – Police officers and deputies, – Jailers and juvenile correction staff, and – Probation agents. • Goal: To train these front-line providers to impact how they respond to citizens in a crisis.
Obstacles to Training • Small agencies (average agency size about 8 officers). • Jail and probation staff sizes are similar. • Time off for training is difficult due to coverage and costs. • Travel distances and job layering made scheduling difficult. • “Sheepdog” vs. “sheeple” – Law enforcement professionals do not want to be trained by people who do not understand police work and emergency response.
Options and Choices • The 40 hour Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training is not a workable option in this setting. • Developed a model, based upon Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) as the core curriculum, while working with the Minnesota (MN) CIT Officers Association. • MHFA was delivered in its entirety – 12-hour course. • Added topics and experiences: – Excited delirium, veteran issues, officer mental health, adolescent mental health. • Crisis de-escalation scenarios with actors and coaches.
Keys to Success Key elements for success included: • Sworn officers involved in training, • Two-day maximum limit, • Comfortable surroundings, • Privacy, • Food, • A lot of discussion time, and • Examples from policing and correctional situations.
Keys to Success • Using actors and coaches with CIT experience was highly successful. • Offering MN POST certification increased interest (Peace Officers Standards and Training). • Letting “cops be cops” made the training more comfortable: – Humor – Blow off steam – Talk about fears – Discuss the conflicts between good mental health approaches and good police work
Keys to Success • Marketing to chiefs and officers has been important. – Flyers and letters – Personal visits – Chiefs lunches – Creating tools for use on the streets – Helping departments with their needs has built relationships • County social services directors have been willing to fund major portions of the training, and are now asking for the same training for their staff.
Tips, Tools, and Outcomes Lessons learned include: • Trainers who have police or crisis response backgrounds are vital. • Location, location, location. Not in a church or public venue. • Good food is important. • POST or similar accreditation is vital. • Be open to tough conversations. • Be aware of potential conflicts between service sectors. • Cooperation between responders and providers has improved.
Tips, Tools, and Outcomes Design your own law enforcement pocket guide: • Assessment tips • Clinical recommendations • Disposition options • Mental health facts and implications • Mental health disorders identified and demystified • Psychiatric medications • Glossary • „Ghostbusters‟ section: “Who ya gonna call?!”
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