- In Ohio, the City of Akron has launched the Summit County Outreach Team, or SCOUT, a first-of-its-kind team in the state “comprised of specially trained first responders, [who] work to de-escalate mental health crises,” Lindsay Buckingham reports for WKYC, Akron’s local NBC affiliate. Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Clarence Tucker explained to the Akron Beacon Journal that the unit provides “immediate intervention and support as an alternative to potential incarceration… ‘many times, when we respond to psychiatric calls, the options are not great. Not every [response] needs to go to jail. They might just need help.’”
- In Montana, Republican Governor Greg Gianforte approved roughly $8 million in funding for statewide expansion of mobile crisis response—$7.5 million “will be available to mobile crisis response and crisis receiving and stabilization services… [so that] providers will be able… to divert patients from local emergency rooms, jails and state-run health facilities,” Seaborn Larson reports for The Bozeman Daily Chronicle. The additional $500,000 in state funding will be used to “create a crisis worker curriculum and certification course to help ‘meet the increasing demand for highly trained behavioral health crisis professionals in Montana.’”
