New efforts

Joe Welsh, director of the Lehigh Valley Justice Institute, is leading an effort to implement a co-responder program in Lehigh County and Allentown similar to those in Oregon and closer to home in Bucks County. Welsh said the practice achieves not only harm reduction, but it also helps local governments and economies by diverting people from the criminal justice system and avoiding the societal costs of incarceration.

“You’re taking all of these down-the-road costs out of the equation by treating mental illness as an illness instead of criminalizing it,” Welsh said.

Lehigh County Commissioner Dave Harrington said the challenge in Lehigh County will be coordinating such a program between the county and nearly two dozen police departments, including the state police. County and Allentown officials recently met with representatives from CAHOOTS and Bucks County, where a pilot program is in place.

“We want to get as much information as we can to ensure that whatever program we choose is successful,” Harrington said.

The Allentown Police Department is already working to build a co-responder system by expanding crisis training for officers in cooperation with Lehigh County Mental Health and Cedar Crest College. It is also hiring a second crisis intervention specialist to assist patrol officers with mental health-related issues. It also works with an Allentown-based addiction treatment center to partner a certified recovery specialist with officers following up on drug and alcohol abuse issues, Chief Glenn E. Granitz Jr. said.

The department’s programs