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Advocates urge county to fund HEART expansion into schools and countywide response teams
Summary
Community members and the Have a Heart coalition urged the board to allocate roughly $450,000 to place peer support specialists in schools and to fund countywide HEART (community response) expansion, saying the program can provide unarmed responses to many calls and reduce reliance on policing.
Speakers representing the Have a Heart coalition and other community groups asked the board to prioritize countywide expansion of the HEART response model and to provide school-based supports. "All that is needed is $450,000," said Reina Resenko of the Have a Heart Coalition, describing a plan to place a peer support specialist in elementary, middle and high schools and to pilot HEART personnel in three volunteer schools.
Multiple commenters described HEART as an unarmed alternative to police response that could handle many crisis calls: one speaker cited a county dashboard showing HEART could respond unarmed to roughly 700'800 calls per month. Advocates asked the board to fund the $450,000 expansion without diverting funds from the DPS request and to work with city partners and the sheriff, who they said has not opposed expansion in principle.
Commissioners did not adopt funding at the meeting but heard calls for dedicated budget allocations and for clearer data on operations and outcomes. Several speakers also linked HEART expansion to broader investments in youth services, early defense representation and housing supports.
