Three years ago, after Minneapolis police killed George Floyd, more people in Seattle began demanding alternatives to conventional policing. Now, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell is launching a pilot program that is a small step in that direction.
Harrell unveiled what his office is calling a new “Community Assisted Response and Engagement” department, formerly the Community Safety and Communications Center. At a news conference last week, Harrell said he wants to spend an additional $6 million on the center. The mayor is proposing a budget of $26.5 million, up from $20.5 million in 2023. Part of that money will be spent on six new behavioral health specialists who will be dispatched to handle lower priority 911 calls.
Seattle Police Chief Adrian Diaz said the new staff won’t necessarily be helping with emergency situations that involve mentally ill people, substance abuse, or weapons. Instead, he said, the community responders will speed the response to things like noise complaints, welfare checks and other kinds of problems.
“We know that staffing is a challenge. We know that we’re having a hard time being able to reach all…it’s not usually the priority one calls that are an issue, even priority two is not an issue. Once you start to get to priority three that does start to become an issue where response times could take up to an hour, if not longer,” Diaz said.
At the Seattle Police Department’s West Precinct, the mayor sat down next to 911 dispatcher Jordan Wallace, as he picked up a call.
The call involved a salon. Someone called to report some kind of illegal activity happening right in front of them. Wallace asked them if there were any drugs or weapons involved. He then described the call as not urgent.
“That’s a pretty typical nonlife-threatening type of call,” Wallace said.
Wallace categorized the call as a "Priority 3" call — the type of call the new community crisis responders will help police handle.
The mayor’s office said they’ll see how the pilot goes, and might ask the responders to handle different kinds of calls in the future.
In other cities, dedicated teams respond to mental health calls. For example, Eugene, Ore., has a program called Crisis Assistance Helping Out On The Streets, or CAHOOT. Two person teams, consisting of a medic and a crisis worker, respond to a wide range of mental health crisis calls.
In Seattle, the fire department has a small team called "Health One,"made up of firefighters and case managers. They help with some medical and mental health calls, and try to connect individuals to services.
The Seattle Police Department says, overall, it’s still down about 600 officers from where it would ideally like to be — at 1,400 officers.
