With the Baltimore City Council poised to issue reforms designed to improve the local 911 emergency call system, Dr. Ivan Sascha Sheehan, interim dean of The University of Baltimore's College of Public Affairs and professor in the School of Public and International Affairs, has co-written an opinion piece on the topic for The Baltimore Sun. While Sheehan and his co-writer, David V. Sheehan, an emeritus professor at the University of South Florida College of Medicine, Distinguished Life Fellow at the American Psychiatric Association and Dr. Sheehan's father, agree that the plan is a step forward, they offer suggestions in the piece on how to improve its chances of success.
The City Council's acceptance of a plan by Mayor Brandon Scott and Council President Zeke Cohen to create a Department of Neighborhood Safety "would fold in the city's existing diversion work and send teams to certain non-life-threatening 911 calls," they write. "The sentiment behind it is commendable, and we think the policy is worth pursuing. We also think the first draft may have picked the wrong people to go through the door first."
People experiencing a mental health crisis can show their symptoms in a variety of ways, they say. Police are not trained to handle these episodes when they respond to a 911 call. The revised system would keep that in mind. But certain requirements should be initiated as the system gears up.
"That is why we would put licensed mental health professionals at the center of these teams, with unlicensed social workers and human services professionals in a supporting role," the pair write. "Peer specialists bring lived experience no textbook can supply, and they belong on the team. But someone with clinical training must be tasked with determining what is actually transpiring."
In cities and towns across the country, 911 systems are being reworked so that services are more effectively delivered, and crisis situations do not escalate into violence involving law enforcement.
"The case for acting is clear," the Sheehans say. "A program that keeps even a few of those calls from becoming funerals is worth investing in."
Read the opinion piece in The Baltimore Sun.
Learn more about Prof. Ivan Sascha Sheehan and The University of Baltimore's College of Public Affairs.