Ten Keys to Improving Emergency Alerts, Warnings & Notifications

 

 

 

Clery Center Executive Director  Jessica Mertz stated, " the Ten Keys highlight critical practices for effectively implementing timely warning and emergency notification requirements under the Clery Act. For example, emergency notification policy must specify who is responsible for specific steps, including confirming an emergency, determining who receives a notification and the content, and initiating the system. T he annual tests required by Clery allow an institution to ensure they're coordinating with on- and off-campus partners prior to an actual emergency and help flag potential concerns. The Ten Keys would be a great resource for a Clery coordinator or team to identify action steps, such as examining message inclusivity or creating or updating templates."

 

 

For additional information about this document or AWN best practices, please email SAFECOM or NCSWIC.

P olice-Mental Health Collaborations: Six Questions to Ask

 

Police officers are increasingly asked to respond to calls for service involving people who may be experiencing a mental health crisis or other mental health need. They may be the first, and only, responder on the scene of a situation that can be more complex and time-consuming than many officers are trained to address. Police departments are increasingly reaching out to those in the behavioral health system, a promising trend and one that has historically highlighted the pervasive gap in mental health services. This is particularly true across college and university campuses where the exponential growth of students suffering from anxiety and depression continues to grow and outpaces clinical services and counseling staff available (see Student Anxiety Continues to Rise Part 1 and Part 2).

 

The Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center, with support from the U.S. Bureau of Justice Assistance, recently released a framework to help law enforcement agencies respond to this challenge. In Police-Mental Health Collaborations: A Framework for Implementing Effective Law Enforcement Responses for People Who Have Mental Health Needs (PDF), the CSG Justice Center discusses how many law enforcement agencies and behavioral health groups have begun taking a proactive approach to improving responses to people with mental health needs. These efforts include improving practices such as providing mental health training to law enforcement workforces and incorporating mental health, crisis intervention, and stabilization training as part of some states' law enforcement training standards. These efforts have led to an understanding that "even the most effective law enforcement responses cannot succeed without mental health services that provide immediate crisis stabilization, follow up, and longer-term support."

 

To address this issue, some law enforcement agencies have committed to comprehensive, agency-wide approaches and partnerships with the behavioral health system. These integrated, cross-system approaches are known as police-mental health collaborations (PMHCs). Whether an agency is seeking to establish a new PMHC or improve an existing one, six important questions must be asked to make sure four key outcomes can be achieved: increase connections to resources; reduce repeat encounters with law enforcement; minimize arrests; and reduce use of force in encounters with people who have mental health needs:

The framework walks through each question explaining why it matters, what the proper answer looks like in practice, and provides a brief example from the field.

 

For additional information about PMHCs and the different PMHC response models, visit the Police Mental Health Collaboration Toolkit website.

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