By Mark Zaretsky
New Haven Register
NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Police and firefighters, as first responders, respond to some crisis calls that might be better suited for social services, so the city now has added a second shift to expand the hours of the Elm City Compass crisis response team, officials announced Wednesday.
Since last November, Elm City Compass, which grew out of the city’s response to the killing by a Minneapolis police officer of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests that followed, has worked with, and sometimes instead of, police and other emergency services personnel to provide social services in crisis situations.
“There are a lot of people here because this is a huge team effort,” Mayor Justin Elicker said at a press conference Wednesday, flanked by more than a dozen people including Director of Community Resilience Carlos Sosa-Lombardo, Elm City Compass Director Jack Tebes, Police Chief Karl Jacobson, Fire Chief John Alston Jr., Public Safety Communications Director Joe Vitale, Hill Alder Kampton Singh, D-5, and Elm City Compass staff and board members.
Elm City Compass complements and supports the work of police, fire and emergency medical services personnel, sending social workers and people with lived experience to 911 calls and via direct outreach to help residents going through mental health, substance use and housing crises and connect them to appropriate services, officials said.
Elm City Compass’ Phase 2 began this month, providing case management services to further assist residents experiencing mental health, substance use and housing challenges, said Elicker. Since then, Compass has responded to nearly 600 calls, including 537 as of June 30, officials said.
Of those, 62 percent were referrals from the Police Department and 21 percent were referrals from the Fire Department, Elicker said.
The city chose to make Wednesday’s announcement in the Kimberly Triangle, which is just off Kimberly Square, “because there are many, many calls that come from the surrounding neighborhood,” which account for about 35 percent of the total, Elicker said.
The Compass staff has been “addressing situations with the right skills at the right time,” said Sosa-Lombardo.
A case manager has been added to the team to work with people who need more intensive support following their initial engagement with the team. In addition, the city will test direct dispatch of the Elm City Compass team by the 911 emergency call center without the police and fire departments, Sosa-Lombardo said.
Compass has an 11-minute average response time and has spent an average of 48 minutes on the scene, said Elicker.
“None of these milestones would be possible without the extraordinary efforts of our staff members,” said Sosa-Lombardo.
Jacobson and Alston both praised the program.
“Having this program has enable us to do things we otherwise might not be doing,” said Jacobson. “We can’t do it alone” and some of the things police initially get sent to are better handled by social workers, he said.
Overall, “this has enabled us to do more,” Jacobson said. “We have always felt as first responders that we needed something else — and this is the something else.”
Having Compass in the mix “provides the extended services” and “the wraparound services” that responders need in many situations, said Alston.
Together, “we’re going to provide better care for our residents.”
Vitale said dispatchers in some cases “send Compass there by themselves,” but might have the police officers also on the scene “but far enough away that they’re not going to agitate somebody.”
“I can tell you, Compass is working and the big reason Compass is working is, we’re listening,” said Tebes. “As we roll out Phase 2, we will be expanding to 16 hours a day, but we also will be expanding what Elm City Compass does.”
Compass stands for “Compassionate Allies Serving Our Streets.”
During the initial pilot phase from Nov. 1, 2022, through June 30, 2023, one team was deployed seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. During Phase Two, two teams will be deployed in two shifts during expanded hours from 8 a.m. to midnight.
A third phase of the initiative is scheduled to begin July 1, 2024, although officials said it has not yet been decided whether it will be expanded to 24 hours or expanded in some other way.
John Labieniec, Elm City Compass’ coordinator, told stories of some of the people the team has helped, including one many who was sleeping on the Police Department steps who now has a place to live and a part-time job, as well as other services he needs.
“I think what makes this project so important is, it’s not just responding,” but team members are “finding the right resources” to connect people to, Labieniec said. “This is something that only is going to continue to grow.”
Megan Ifill, a member of the Compass board, said that one of the great things about Compass is that it gives people “better tools to take care of each other.”
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