Wellness Crisis Call Center & Response Team Update In Sacramento County

Press release from the Sacramento County Government:

December 7, 2021

Sacramento County Behavioral Health Services is inviting the public to a virtual report back from 3 – 5 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 13 on the progress of the Wellness Crisis Call Center and Response Team (formerly Alternatives to 911 for Mental Health). During the meeting, Behavioral Health Services staff will share community input and discuss next steps on the design of the program. A tentative go-live date is July 2022.

Flyers for the session are available in Arabic, Chinese, Farsi, Hmong, Russian, Spanish and Vietnamese on the Wellness Crisis Call Center and Response website. You can register for the Zoom meeting online. Sacramento County Behavioral Health Services gathered input from more than 550 community members to guide the initial design of a mobile mental health crisis system that would serve as an alternative to the 911 emergency line for people experiencing mental health crises. The county Board of Supervisors approved funding for the program in 2021.

The goals of the pending program are:

• To increase mental health response to calls for service;
• Decrease law enforcement response to mental health distress, crisis or other quality of life issues;
• Decrease unnecessary emergency department visits and psychiatric hospitalizations; and
• Decrease relapse into crisis by linking to ongoing outpatient mental health services.

If you have questions or if you wish to arrange for an interpreter or a reasonable accommodation, please contact Darlene Moore at (916) 875-7227 or MooreDa@Saccounty.net.

This press release was produced by the Sacramento County Government. The views expressed here are the author’s own.