Centerstone's Community Crisis Response Partnerships (C-CCRP) project will enhance infrastructure to expand mobile crisis response teams (MCRT) to provide culturally response and developmentally-/age- appropriate services to divert individuals experiencing a mental health crises from law enforcement encounters in a high need geographic area comprising ten South Central Indiana counties. C-CCRP will serve 925 unduplicated individuals (Y1: 175; Y2-4: 250/yr.).
C-CCRP will serve adults, children, and youth experiencing mental health crises in Bartholomew, Brown, Decatur, Jackson, Jennings, Johnson, Lawrence, Monroe, Morgan, and Owen counties. Centerstone has the only MCRT in the 3,972 square mile geographic area. Up to 38% of the 32,852 Bloomington PD 911 calls for service in the past 6 months were related to behavioral health issues. In 2022, only 30% of area counties have/will offer CIT to law enforcement. Focus population demographics are expected to mirror those of the catchment area, which comprises 78% adults and 22% children/youth; 50% male and 50% female; and 90% White, 2% Black/African American, and 4% Hispanic/Latino individuals. Prevalent mental health, substance use, and socioeconomic risk factors for behavioral health crisis point to a need to implement effective mobile crisis services. For example, of the catchment area’s 498,627 adults, 22% are expected to have a mental illness. Approximately 15.5% of area youth ages 12-17 have Major Depressive Episode and 12% have serious thoughts of suicide. In 2021, 617 catchment area persons were hospitalized and 1,872 persons had ED visits related to a drug overdose.
C-CCRP will increase the capacity of and timely access to 24/7 MCRTs, increase collaboration with law enforcement/988/call centers, and improve equity in the continuity of care and post-crisis follow-up. C-CCRP’s 2-person MCRTs will provide in-person/telehealth response including screening/assessment; community stabilization; safety planning; referral to enhanced services after stabilization; and post-crisis follow-up. C-CCRP will conduct community mapping to identify service needs/gaps, provide crisis intervention training, develop protocols to improve coordination with first responders and community providers, coordinate with relevant state efforts, and implement a data system to track outcomes. C-CCRP will accomplish the following goals: 1) Develop a sound infrastructure and increased capacity to deliver mobile crisis response services for persons of all ages in the catchment area; 2) Increase crisis system collaboration within the proposed high-needs communities to ensure a comprehensive, integrated services to address the focus populations’ needs; 3) Enhance MCRT to ensure trauma-informed and culturally, age, and developmentally appropriate services to divert adults, children, and youth experiencing mental health crises from law enforcement to community stabilization; 4) Improve crisis system performance via expanded access to mobile crisis response services in proposed high-need communities; 5) Promote improved mental health outcomes among adults, children, and youth experiencing mental health crises; and 6) Develop/disseminate a documented service model for replication/adoption. As a result of these goals/improvements, the project will achieve the following measurable objectives among populations receiving crisis response: Screen 100%, refer 100% to needed services, increase access to services for 60%, reduce suicide risk for 100%, and reduce arrest/detention by 30%. The project will achieve the following measurable objectives in the high needs community served: Resolve 70% of MCRT responses in the community, divert 40% from law enforcement, increase referrals to MCRT by 50%; and increase knowledge of effective crisis response among 60% of first responders trained.