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Lane County leaders stress public-safety staffing shortfalls and new behavioral health responses
Summary
Sheriff Clifton Harrold described a decades-long decline in patrol staffing; the county outlined a new mobile crisis program, a 24/7 behavioral health stabilization center and an in-jail partnership to connect people to services on release.
Lane County officials used the State of the County address to describe long-running public-safety staffing shortfalls and to preview new behavioral-health response programs intended to reduce reliance on emergency rooms and jails.
Why it matters: County leaders said staffing shortfalls in patrol and increasing behavioral-health needs are undermining service delivery; the county plans mobile crisis teams, a 24/7 stabilization center and inside-jail recovery services to fill gaps.
Sheriff Clifton G. Harrold told the audience the sheriff’s office is under-resourced for patrol. "We have 30 30 fewer deputy sheriffs today than we had in 1979 to patrol unincorporated Lane County," Harrold said, adding that county population has grown by "well over a 100,000 people since then."
County leaders described a recent partnership that places Emergence Addiction and Behavioural Therapies staff in the county jail lobby to provide peer support, substance-abuse recovery services, gambling-addiction services, mental-health therapy and housing-location assistance at release. Commissioner Lori Trigger called the partnership "innovative" and said it will "save lives."
Trigger and other commissioners also described a mobile crisis program launched during the year and plans for a behavioral health stabilization center intended to provide 24/7 urgent-care-style access for behavioral-health crises. The stabilization center is planned to offer multiple levels of care, including a walk-in urgent-care model, peer support, case management, therapy and psychiatric prescribers; a short-term crisis stabilization unit will support adults for up to 23 hours, 59 minutes, as described in the remarks.
Trigger said the stabilization center is expected to reduce inappropriate emergency-room use by providing a dedicated space for behavioral-health needs. She said hospital staff have told county officials that behavioral-health patients have sometimes occupied hallways while awaiting placement and that the new center could alleviate that pressure.
The Board of Commissioners also noted an ongoing public safety funding committee chaired by Courtney Griesel with vice chair former County Commissioner Faye Stewart and said that committee is meeting to seek solutions, with results hoped for in the county's first quarter.
