Members of the public had a chance to learn about and give their input, on how local police handle addictions and mental health calls on Tuesday. But some people who took part in a community forum on the issue felt it came up short.
Representatives from multiple area police services and mental health agencies took part in the forum, hosted by the City of Belleville. It outlined the various programs in place to support the public and officers, when comes to handling the increasing number of mental health-related calls.
During the first hour of the event, which featured a panel discussion, Police Chief Mike Callaghan said that his department wants to be “part of the solution, not part of the problem” and that more than 40% of their service calls involve some sort of mental health component.
He says there was a 27% increase in mental health calls for service between 2019 and 2020 alone.
Belleville Police Inspector Sheri Meeks shared some data on the ongoing Health IM program, which was put in place in 2019 and says that partnership with Addictions and Mental Health has made a big difference.
“When our officers are on a call and are responding to a call that has a mental health component to it, they’re able to go through this risk assessment and determine ‘how can I best serve this individual that I’m dealing with’. Whether we apprehend, or whether we find a better community support for this individual.”
Meeks also spoke about the IMPACT program, which recently received some provincial funding, while representatives from Lennox and Addington OPP and Kingston Police also touted some of their mental health-related initiatives as well.
Local mental health professionals from Addictions and Mental Health HPE, the Enrichment Centre for Mental Health and other organizations, also spoke about their partnerships with police and the difference that those programs are making.
Belleville councillors and representatives from local police services, and mental health and addictions organizations, take part in an online forum on Tuesday March 9, 2021. (Photo: YouTube / BellevilleCityHall)
Following the educational session, members of the public were invited to share their experiences and ask questions, but many of the police officials and other panelists left the event.
Britney Hope, who represents local advocacy groups including the Belleville Peaceful Streets Network, Anti-Racism Quinte and the Structural Violence Accountability Alliance, spoke to Quinte News following the forum.
She says while the event had good intentions, it missed the mark in a few areas, including having a sign language interpreter involved, or making the event more accessible for those who may not have been able to get online themselves.
Hope tells Quinte News the event would have been better if there was more collaboration with other community groups in putting it together and if Belleville Police officials had stayed to answer direct questions from the public.
“This is yet another case of Belleville citizens rising to participate in the conversations shaping their community and the leader of our police couldn’t bring himself to stick around to hear them. All that was left was our council, who weren’t able to answer questions directed to the police and our mayor, who directed us to look to the provincial government.”
She says the BPSN will likely push for another similar event that will hopefully involve more community input and help to truly address some of the issues around policing that are being discussed in the greater community.
Belleville Councillor Chris Malette had organized the forum and says the intent was always to educate council members and the public, and never to make it an opportunity to take shots at the police force.
He tells Quinte News, he thought the educational component hit the mark, but he can see why some people weren’t satisfied.
“Some of them have valid concerns, but I don’t think this was the forum that that was going to be achieved in. When you open it up to the community, you can’t be all things to all people and I think in terms of an education piece, it was amazing. There were some frustrations from members of the community that it didn’t achieve what they had hoped it to achieve, but that wasn’t the goal of the night.”
Malette is encouraging residents who want to address the police service to look into making presentations to the Police Services Board.
You can watch the full forum below:
