Portland Street Response led to 9 housing successes, no arrests in first year – OregonLive

Portlands 14-month old crisis response program that sends mental health workers instead of police to most low-level mental health crisis calls received high ratings from people it served, according to a year-end progress report released Tuesday.

In the first year, the Portland Street Response team responded to more than 900 calls. Most individuals received assistance on site and many were connected to additional follow-up support, the report said. That led nine formerly unhoused individuals to receive help finding an apartment. No one was harmed during any incidents the team responded to and no one was arrested, the report said.

The program aims to reduce the number of behavioral health calls that police or fire officials respond to and instead send first responders who are better trained to deescalate mental health episodes and care for clients during those moments of crisis.

Championed by Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, the city-funded program launched in mid-February of 2021 in the Lents neighborhood, expanded to a broader area in east Portland in November and then went citywide on March 28.

Even though it is an expansion of our first responder system, it is not the traditional first responder, said Hardesty, who oversees Portland Fire & Rescue, which houses Portland Street Response. The program has also been able to host de-escalation training for neighborhood associations and businesses and host resource fairs in underserved communities, she said.

The creation of the team led to an overall 4% reduction in total emergency calls traditionally dispatched to police and a 27% reduction in welfare checks and unwanted person calls that police would typically have responded to, according to the one-year evaluation was conducted by Portland State Universitys Homelessness Research and Action Collaborative. The report was presented to the City Council Tuesday.

On average, unhoused community members served by Portland Street Response rated their satisfaction level with the program as a 4.6 on a 5-point scale.

The team responded to 903 incidents during its first year. In one-third of those cases, team members could not find the person theyd been summoned to check on. Most calls are made by onlookers and not the individual in need.

In 26% of cases, a person was evaluated but workers concluded no additional extensive treatment was needed. In 17% of cases, the person workers were summoned to check on refused evaluation or treatment. In 9% of cases, the person was located and deemed in need of treatment, two-thirds of whom were treated by the team while the other one-third were treated and then transferred by ambulance for additional care.

While the team is designed to serve an emergency response function, clients have the option of being connected to ongoing support. They can either get connected to one of the teams community health workers or peer support specialists or else be referred to another homelessness organization. This networking system led to nine people who were experiencing homelessness moving into a permanent home in the past year, the report said.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said he would like the program to provide more intentional wrap-around services to individuals it interacts with over and over. That could reduce the number of emergency calls to both Portland Street Response and police, he said.

Of the total calls, 65% involved clients experiencing homelessness and 52% involved someone with suspected mental health needs.

The fact that none of the calls led to an arrest is significant, as 51% of unhoused people that Portland State interviewed said they did not feel safe calling 911 if they or someone else needed help. This percent was even higher for Black, Native American and multiracial individuals surveyed.

One homeless person interviewed by Portland State researchers said they didnt feel safe calling police for help during mental health emergencies because in the past they had difficulty communicating with them because (the police) just assumed it was drug related because Im houseless. Theyre supposed to be saving a life, not judging a life.

Another unhoused person said they would only call police if they were dying because when they previously called 911 for help, they ended up getting arrested.

While Portland Street Response workers have continued to build trust with community members and spoke well about their experiences serving the community, they told researchers that they faced barriers connecting clients to long-term mental health care, because there arent enough mental health services available. They also expressed interested in being allowed to respond to suicide calls in place of police.

Robyn Burek, Portland Street Response program manager, said she hopes to add additional team members in the coming years and to work with the Portland Police Bureau and its union to expand the type of calls her team members are allowed to respond to. Burek said city council will receive recommendations on expansion by June 30.

Nicole Hayden reports on homelessness for The Oregonian/OregonLive. She can be reached at nhayden@oregonian.com or on Twitter @Nicole_A_Hayden.

See the article here:

Portland Street Response led to 9 housing successes, no arrests in first year - OregonLive