BALTIMORE — The Baltimore City Council is proposing forming a best-in-class community safe response system.
WATCH: Baltimore City officials working to improve response to calls for mental health crises.
It would include dispatching trained civilians instead of police for non-violent, non-criminal situations.
Council President Zeke Cohen explained why it's needed.
"Many of the issues that people call 911 about are mental or behavioral health issues, and we need to make sure we deploy the right responders to address that kind of issue," he said, "Cops are not clinicians."
This comes after three Baltimoreans experiencing mental health crises were killed by police in August.
But the council isn't starting from scratch.
Following the DOJ's consent decree in 2017, the Behavioral Health System Baltimore was created to respond to calls like these.
A system that the council, including Councilwoman Odette Ramos, found is lacking, especially when it comes to response times.
"It was a police response, and the person ended up dying, and there were no clinicians out there, there were no - what happened, why is it not working?" Ramos asked.
Sarah Whaley, Executive Director of Overdose Response, responded, saying they are experiencing resource constraints and are working on response times.
They're also in the process of building out a 24/7 net of services that address factors that contribute to behavioral health crises in the city.
"To stand up this work, I want to note that we have secured $15 million from the opioid restitution fund," Whaley said.
Durham, North Carolina, and Denver, Colorado, have similar systems to the one the council is proposing.
Durham Police Chief Patrice Andrews and Andrew Dameron, Director of Denver 911, are both seeing success.
"Repeat callers from crises, we're starting to see more of those folks actually being connected with services," Andrews said.
"When star responds to behavioral health-related 911 calls without police involvement, those who receive a star clinical encounter are less likely to have future police contacts or arrests in the following year compared to those who receive a police only response on that initial call," Dameron followed.
Cohen said these conversations will continue.
Next, they'll be planning on going to Durham to see how the city's implementation of its crisis response system works.
