{"id":41261,"date":"2021-10-19T16:22:10","date_gmt":"2021-10-19T23:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=41261"},"modified":"2021-10-19T16:22:10","modified_gmt":"2021-10-19T23:22:10","slug":"supervisor-hahn-wants-mental-health-professionals-on-metro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=41261","title":{"rendered":"Supervisor Hahn Wants Mental Health Professionals on Metro"},"content":{"rendered":"

Los Angeles, CA \u2013 Today, the LA County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a\u00a0proposal<\/a>\u00a0by Supervisor Janice Hahn and co-authored by Supervisor Hilda Solis that allows the LA County Department of Mental Health to enter negotiations with Metro about the possibility of using county mental health professionals to respond to mental health crises aboard Metro\u2019s trains and buses.<\/p>\n

\u201cI, personally, think this is a great idea,\u201d said Supervisor Hahn, who authored the motion. \u201cAnyone who has taken Metro knows there is a need for mental health professionals on our transit system. Our County mental health professionals are trained to handle difficult situations and connect people with the long-term treatment and support they need.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following the death of George Floyd and protests nationwide, Supervisor Hahn co-authored a motion with fellow Metro board member Councilman Mike Bonin to rethink public safety on our transit system and create a Public Safety Advisory Committee. \u00a0In anticipation of the Committee’s recommendations, Metro staff reached out to the County Department of Mental Health to discuss implementing mental health crisis response teams in the transit system.\u00a0There is no agreement currently.<\/u>\u00a0\u00a0The passage of this\u00a0motion<\/a>\u00a0allows the Department of Mental Health to begin official conversations with Metro about providing mental health crisis response services and give the department the authority to enter into a contract if an agreement is reached.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis potential partnership between our Department of Mental Health and Metro is crucial to re-imagining how we can assist and support residents who experience mental health crises on buses and rail cars throughout Metro\u2019s transit network,\u201d shared said Metro Board Chair and Chair of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors Hilda L. Solis. \u201cProviding our riders with the resources and services they need is how we can bring equitable transportation to every resident.\u201d<\/p>\n

The County Department of Mental Health currently operates two types of mental health crisis teams. \u00a0One is known as a Mental Evaluation Team (MET) which consists of one highly trained law enforcement officer paired with one DMH-licensed mental health clinician to provide a specialized response to the highest-risk crises with the goal of diverting these individuals to treatment, minimizing uses of force and harmful outcomes, and mitigating incarceration and justice system involvement. \u00a0The other type of team is an unarmed, non-law enforcement Psychiatric Mobile Response Teams (PMRT) with teams consisting of at least one licensed mental health clinician and at least one other mental health professional.<\/p>\n

Under the leadership of Supervisor Hahn, the County is\u00a0working to expand<\/a>\u00a0the number of PMRT teams available and move the program to 24\/7. \u00a0\u00a0These professional mental health teams will be accessible through the upcoming national mental health crisis hotline 9-8-8, which is set to launch next summer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Los Angeles, CA \u2013 Today, the...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ca-local","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41261"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41261\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41262,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41261\/revisions\/41262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}