LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — The federal Bureau of Justice Assistance has awarded a $500,000 grant to the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) to create crisis response teams of Little Rock police officers and social workers.
The three-year grant will be used to hire four social workers to work alongside police in situations where individuals may be having a mental health crisis.
Additionally, the funding will be used to train first responders on how to recognize a crisis situation and properly respond to it.
“Mental health is an issue that continues to plague the communities in which we police. As the incidents in the communities evolve, so must our efforts to serve and protect,” said Heath Helton, Little Rock Chief of Police. “This is the first of its kind in Little Rock, and we are thankful to do our part to address this national issue.”
Lisa Evans, Ph.D., director of the UAMS Pulaski County Regional Crisis Stabilization Unit and an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry, assisted with the grant application and will help train participants in the program.
According to Evans, approximately half of the people in U.S. jails and over one-third of the population of U.S. prisons have been diagnosed with a mental illness.
“We have continued to incarcerate the problem of mental illness, but there are several ways to solve it,” she said. “One way is for these people to go into treatment instead of jail, keep them out of the justice system where they are subject to discrimination and marginalization.”
Evans added that the program will also allow the police to concentrate their efforts on crimes of a serious nature.
“Officers want to be able to focus on fighting crime. This program will allow specially trained officers and a social work team to respond to mental health issues while the rest of the team keeps fighting crime. We’re hoping that this program will evolve into a national model and help the city to utilize the resources of the police more effectively,” she said.