Remand centre idea ‘horrific’
Police proposal for handling the mentally ill draws criticism
It’s a new cost-cutting proposal mental health advocates are calling “horrific.”
In a brief to city councillors this week, Edmonton police said they are lobbying the province for the right to take mental health patients to receive treatment at the Edmonton Remand Centre rather than waiting for help in crowded emergency rooms, even though these people have not committed a crime.
Police spent an average 3.3 hours waiting in the emergency department this fall for every person apprehended under the Alberta Mental Health Act.
The budget brief says members of the community policing bureau detain an average 70 mental health patients a month, and spent 202 hours waiting in the emergency department between Sept. 22 and Oct. 19, 2015.
But taking people having a psychotic break or suicidal thoughts to the remand centre is not the answer, said Tom Shand with the Alberta Alliance on Mental Illness and Mental Health.
“It would be horrific if they started taking people to the remand centre for mental health treatment,” Shand said.
“I understand police logic in not wanting to spend huge amounts of time in emergency rooms ... but they need to look at alternatives.
“We’re afraid of the police. I’m afraid of the police and I don’t want to be put in jail. This is very visceral,” added Austin Mardon, an Order of Canada recipient who also lives with schizophrenia. “(The remand centre) is not a treatment facility. It’s a prison. There’s a clear delineation between being sick and doing a crime.”
A remand centre is a facility where prisoners are temporarily detained while awaiting trial or sentencing.
Alberta Health Services has nursing staff as well as a doctor and psychiatrists available at the new northwest remand centre. But the provincial definition of “designated facilities” would have to change before police could legally bring a mental health patient there.
A police spokeswoman wasn’t aware of the proposal and suggested police were referring to the old remand centre instead. Although that empty building is sometimes used as an overflow shelter, it has no treatment options. Police were unable to make anyone familiar with the proposal available for comment.
The budget brief came out Monday with written responses to councillor questions on the proposed operating budget. Council starts debating the budget this Friday.
Pressured by an increase in emergency calls, police are asking for 27 more full-time positions to man the new northwest division station, plus 130 new front-line officers, 32 more investigators and more behind-the-scenes support over the next three years.
In the budget documents, police outlined several efforts to deal with mental health concerns. Police said they’ve worked with partners to identify the 19 highest users of emergency services. Of those, 13 have now been housed. The service also offers more training for officers on how to relate to mental health patients. It is also trying to convince Alberta Health Services to rank involuntary mental health patients higher during triage to get them seen faster.
The long-term solution is a community wellness centre for the chronically homeless, serial inebriates and mentally ill. But, police wrote, “the issue concerning wait times at hospital emergency departments is of an urgent nature and cannot be left unattended for another 12 — 16 months.”
Shand said he’s been impressed with changes police have made in recent years, including their multi-disciplinary crisis units. He wondered if police listed this option knowing it would shock, just to bring attention to their plight. “The Edmonton Police Service is very knowledgeable about these things,” he said.
Coun. Andrew Knack said he asked the question about police in emergency departments because Edmonton might be better off diverting funds to a REACH Edmonton proposal to expand their 24-7 crisis unit. That unit responds without police when possible, connecting those struggling with mental illness to social support or health care.