Erie County works to improve behavioral health crisis response

Erie County is working to improve the way it responds to behavioral health crises, as the Crisis to Care Collaborative shares its progress, community-driven changes and priorities moving forward.

The countywide initiative brings together 34 partners from public safety, behavioral health, health care, government and advocacy groups, including people with lived experience, to create a more coordinated and compassionate crisis response system.

Right now, our system really defaults to nine one one police response and then hospitals or jail. And that's just not what people need when they're in crisis, and it's not going to help them get to recovery, said Jane Mogavero, executive director of the Patrick P. Lee Foundation.

The collaborative is focusing on three key areas: someone to call, someone to respond and somewhere to go.

Those priorities include improving how behavioral health crisis calls are identified and handled, expanding access to mobile behavioral health teams and increasing options for people who need immediate care outside of traditional emergency departments.

Erika Shields, commissioner of the Buffalo Police Department, said bringing different organizations together has helped move the effort forward.

What's been fantastic about Crisis to Care is it's brought all of these different entities, all of us who have a role in mental health, to the table. And we've actually made inroads relying on data and we've made progress, Shields said.

One area of focus is improving how 911 calls involving behavioral health concerns are handled.

Brian Ross, commissioner of Erie County Central Police Services, said dispatchers can receive calls that are initially classified as unknown trouble or other emergencies, even when someone may be experiencing a mental health crisis.

Call takers receive a phone call and it could be an unknown trouble or a person with a knife call. And that call also needs to be a crisis. We don't want to get that call. So trying to bridge that gap and kind of properly code the call to reflect the mental health crisis that's occurring as well, even if it's happening, Ross said.

He said improving how those calls are identified can help ensure the response better reflects the situation and connects people with the appropriate resources.

The collaborative has identified 10 objectives, each with specific targets to measure progress. Those include increasing the number of calls that receive a behavioral health response when possible and reducing the number of people taken to hospitals during a crisis.

Partners plan to reconvene in early 2027 to evaluate their progress and determine how much closer they have come to meeting those goals.

Leaders also say making families aware of available resources is an important part of improving the system.

Shields encouraged community members to learn about the organizations and services available to support people experiencing mental health challenges.

She said families should know they do not have to navigate those situations alone and that organizations throughout the community are ready to help.

The Crisis to Care Collaborative says its long-term goal is to connect people experiencing behavioral health crises with the appropriate care, while creating more effective alternatives to traditional emergency responses.