COLLEGE STATION, Texas (KBTX) – The College Station City Council reviewed the community’s mental health resources and the police department’s response to mental health crisis calls during a meeting Thursday night.

As mental health crises increase, police officers often serve as first responders to emergency calls.

“In the end, the first immediate calls typically come into a dispatch center, and those dispatchers look for a resource, and their first resource is a police officer,” said College Station Police Chief Billy Couch.

Crisis prevention team responds to challenging calls

The College Station Police Department has developed a 20-person crisis prevention team over the past couple of years to handle more challenging mental health calls.

“I have team members that are quite passionate about this initiative, so when you have people that are passionate with a good work ethic, you’re going to get positive outcomes,” Couch said.

The team’s interventions sometimes result in transporting individuals to the hospital. Those individuals then have to be transported via the Brazos County Sheriff’s Office to a place outside of Brazos County because there are no local overnight mental health facilities.

The closest overnight mental health facility available to local law enforcement is in Houston.

“It would be nice if we had something here locally. We have a large and growing community with a lot of demand for mental health consumers, so it would be nice if we had that here locally,” Couch said.

Councilwoman Melissa McIlhaney emphasized the need to continue discussions about additional mental health resources for both the public and law enforcement agencies.

“I think there is enough of a need that a conversation should be started,” said McIlhaney.

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