Local Law Enforcement Officers Complete Crisis Intervention Team Training

Kevin Rau serves the Marion County Sheriff's Office as Spokesman Photo By: Tim King

(Salem) - There are many people in jails and prisons across the country with significant mental illnesses. Because of that fact, the burden is placed on corrections managers to provide mental health services in a setting not ideal for that purpose.

In Marion County alone, $20,000 a month is spent on psychotropic medications for inmates at the Marion County Jail. As is often the case, many receive treatment while incarcerated, but those services are interrupted or stop completely once a person is released.

The Marion County Sheriff`s Office and Marion County Mental Health are working together to establish a seamless transition back into the community for those being released from jail who need ongoing mental health treatment. We would be remiss, however, were this endeavor not to include the District Attorney`s Office and the courts, both of which are intimately involved in this ongoing process in Marion County.

One aspect of the collaboration between the law enforcement and mental health communities is the development of a crisis-intervention training program. On Friday, January 27th, 33 deputies and officers from the Marion County Sheriff`s Office, Woodburn Police Department, Aumsville Police Department, and the Gervais Police Department, as well as the Marion County District Attorney`s Office, completed a forty hour Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training. The training provided participants with insight into the world of those experiencing a mental health crisis. The course, hosted by the Marion County Sheriff`s Office, included presentations from mental health care consumers, mental health professionals and those in the criminal justice field with specific experience in working with those in mental health crisis.

This training was modeled after similar training programs conducted by the Portland Police Bureau and the Clackamas County Sheriff`s Office, among others, and was the result of developing a close partnership between law enforcement and the mental health community.

Every effort is being made to promote deeper understanding of what a person in a mental health crisis is experiencing so deputies and officers can take a more comprehensive approach in their response. CIT training has had a significant impact in many communities by providing responders with enhanced skills and tools and will likely have a similar impact in Marion County.

The Sheriff`s Office will continue to offer this training to law enforcement agencies throughout Marion County and beyond.