Lane County is hoping to change the way law enforcement and other first responders interact with people with mental illness. A simple consent form is part of a new initiative aimed at improving response to those in crisis.
The voluntary form will include information about a person’s mental health condition and who to contact in a crisis. Lane County Sheriff Byron Trapp says his deputies interact with people with mental illnesses regularly.
“And so, I know that these circumstances occur in Lane County with city police officers, state troopers, and deputy sheriffs and parole and probation.” Trapp says, “These occur on a daily basis. So this is critical to enhancing the safety of our community members, those who suffer the mental illnesses and their families and certainly for the officers involved.”
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Trapp says the consent form information will be shared among law enforcement agencies. He says it gives options for de-escalation and resolution that the officers might otherwise not know of and may keep people with mental illnesses out of jail.