Local officers take time off to learn about mental health issues
Keeping the public safe is the top job of every law enforcement officer locally or otherwise, but when they encounter a person who doesn't know they are a danger to themselves or others, how do they respond?
That was the topic of a recent training session involving officers from several different agencies in and around Polk County looking to better help people who suffer from a variety of mental illness issues who form part of a statewide effort to create Crisis Intervention Teams.
Lt. Scott Ford with the Polk County Sheriff's Office helped organize the training session which provided a variety of information to officers, on what to do with a variety of issues and what police and families can do legally to help those suffering from mental illness issues.
Participating agencies for this round of training included the Sheriff's Office, the Cedartown Police Department, Proba- tion and Parole officers, Bartow County Sheriff's Office deputies and more.
Created in 2004 as a collaboration between the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) and the Department Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities, the program is designed to give law enforcement a better understanding of helping those in the community who have mental health issues.
Governor Nathan Deal decided in September 2016 to move the program from the GBI to the responsibility of the Georgia Public Safety Training Center, and mandated that all the law enforcement officers within the state get the training.
This round gave local officers from the various agencies a rundown of what to expect when they encounter someone with a mental illness while on the job, strategies to help calm potentially problematic situations, and the rules and guidelines governing how people can be involuntarily tak- en to the hospital for an evaluation, for instance.
Ford told officers that ultimately, much of what they seek when they are helping people who may need evaluation and treatment for mental illness issues is to serve and protect the community. But he also pointed out that not helping people leads to liability for law enforcement.
"You have a 100 percent chance of running into someone with mental illness issues, and we must train you officers on how to handle individuals otherwise we face those federal lawsuits that no one wants to be involved in," said Ford.
NAMI Rome president Bonnie Moore described how if law enforcement aren't well educated on the issues, it can turn disastrous. She told officers during the session of a case involving a young man her family was trying to help who ended up in intensive care for two days after he attempted suicide by swallowing pills.
She pointed out that officers should help those who are in such condi- tions as a for instance, operating under good faith.
Moore said she was glad that Polk County was holding a training session and getting more officers locally educated on issues surrounding those with mental health issues, and also in erasing the stigma around it.
Ford said that training sessions will be held again on October 23 through Oct. 27, and that some slots are being left open not just for law enforcement officers, but community stakeholders as well.
His hopes are that with more people trained on helping those with mental health problems, the more likely it will be those who don't realize they need help will get it.
The ultimate goal is to have at least a minimum of 20 percent of all law enforcement officers in the state and have at least one person in each agency with the training.
Those who want to take part in the October class can contact Ford at JSFord@polkga.org.