Coalition brings organizations together in crisis

WASILLA — The idea of shared responsibility for assisting people in crisis that formed almost two years ago is finally starting to gain ground.

At a local opioid task force meeting at MY House this month, Alaska State Trooper B Detachment Captain Hans Brinke introduced some community members to the Valley’s Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) Coalition — a network of first responders, doctors, court system staff, mental health professionals, educators and more who have come together to combat the Valley’s biggest threats, including substance abuse.

“We all agreed that we’ve got a problem, now what are we gonna do about it?” was the question, Brinke said at the task force meeting.

The answer was the coalition, which came into existence largely thanks to the Mat-Su Health Foundation. Brinke said the foundation’s initiative in sponsoring local training and education like the Mental Health First Aid class offered at Station 61 in Wasilla last week had been huge in creating a community resource.

The coalition is basically an expanded version of the Anchorage Police Department’s CIT — a police-based first-responder program focused on “pre-arrest jail diversion for those in mental illness crisis,” according to a May 2016 CIT training document produced by APD.

In practice, that means that, when an officer responds to a call, he or she uses his or her training and understanding of mental illness to address the needs and behavior of the individual without inadvertently instigating an argument or physical altercation with the person that would end in an arrest and consequent jail time.

Since the local trooper detachment only has five or six men to cover the Palmer-Wasilla area on a given day, Brinke said he can’t afford to dedicate even a handful of people solely to crisis intervention, which is where the coalition comes in.

If, for example, a 911 call is made for a suicidal person, but no crime has been committed, a firefighter or paramedic trained in crisis intervention or mental health first aid might be able to respond in a trooper’s place and neutralize the situation, in the event that responders are occupied elsewhere.

“If they can start learning how to better talk with people during crisis, de-escalate and bring ’em down, maybe we don’t have to go to every one of those calls,” Brinke said.

When a crime has been committed — say troopers bust someone for injuring another person while intoxicated by illegal drugs — the situation gets trickier, though the emphasis is still on getting the individual the treatment they need, and want, Brinke said.

“If you commit a crime, you’re gonna have to pay for it. That’s a decision that people make. But do they need to go into the criminal justice system right then? Not every person needs to go there,” he said.

However, with just one detoxification center in Southcentral Alaska and few psychiatric facilities in the area, jails and prisons can end up as a dumping ground for people who need to be actively treated for a damaging disorder.

“I’d love to see a huge psych ER, a detox facility, some sleep off facilities, a 200-man inpatient treatment facility…. Can we get there? That’s the challenge of everybody here in the community to get us there,” Brinke said.

There may be no immediate solution to the crowded prisons and lack of medical care for people struggling with substance abuse and mental health disorders now, but with more and more members of the coalition receiving training in mental health first aid, perhaps a few more people in crisis will be diverted from jail and connected to much needed resources when it counts.

Though the Valley does not have a formal Crisis Intervention Team, Brinke said anyone who makes a 911 call can ask for a CIT-trained specialist, who will be dispatched according to the situation.

Contact reporter Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.