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BELLEFONTE -- The Centre County Board of Commissioners will consider a memorandum of understanding involving Centre Helps and Centre County 911 dispatchers at its next voting session.
The board on Tuesday heard about the MOU during its regular meeting.
Norm Spackman, Director of Emergency Communications, and Denise McCann, Executive Director of Centre Helps, were in attendance to discuss the MOU.
Centre Helps is a local safety net for anyone in need. They connect with the community through their 24/7 hotline, text, chat and community collaborations. Well trained and compassionate staff helps to stabilize the crisis, providing help and hope. They provide over the phone counseling to callers for the 988 Crisis and Suicide Prevention Lifeline.
The MOU was requested from the 988 organization in order to have in writing the way the two organizations help one another on a day-to-day basis.
Spackman explained some of the details of the MOU, indicating that it defines the responsibilities for Centre Help's staff when a person calls in with a crisis. It also defines the non-threatening circumstances which Centre County 9-1-1 dispatchers can transfer the call to Centre Helps and how 9-1-1 will deal with requests from Centre Helps that involve emergency situations that require swift action in order to prevent danger to life, serious damage to property, forestall imminent escape of a suspect or destruction of evidence.
The MOU is typical of what these two organizations do every day and will not change their day-to-day work.
"9-1-1 and 9-8-8, we've always worked cooperatively together but now they're requiring more formalized MOUs. We put that into writing how we already work together," said McCann.
"It’s very stressful for the 9-1-1 dispatchers to handle pretty much anything that comes over the phone, but (it’s) an important job and we appreciate what they do. Now it looks like Centre Helps is going to step up and do a lot more work," said Chairman Mark Higgins.
Centre Helps has information on their website -- centrehelps.org/history -- about the history of helping; for over 50 years they have helped Centre County residents in crisis situations. From alcohol and drug interventions to their current mission to empower anyone in need, Centre Helps has your back.
"Most people who call us want help, they just need a little help getting to that point of being ready to accept help. Our hotline counselors are amazing, really dedicated," said McCann.
Specifically, their 9-8-8 number has been in operation for about a year, though the line itself has been in operation for much longer.
"The bottom line is that it’s imperative that individuals in crisis receive responses that are appropriate to the type of crisis they're experiencing. If it's a mental health call and it goes to 9-1-1, those operators don't have time to counsel people and that's not what they're trained to do. Likewise if it's an emergency that needs an immediate response, our counselors don't have the training for that," said McCann.
With a growing need for mental health care throughout the world, Centre Help provides emotional support, crisis counseling and information and referrals by phone, text/chat or walk-in services; they also provide after-hours support from partner organizations such as Centre Safe, Alcoholics Anonymous and Crossroads Counseling, as well as several private practices
"Across the country they have seen about a 46 percent increase in calls, much higher increases in text and chat. Here in Centre County we've seen our call level, specific to the 9-8-8 line, tripled in the year. We expect that to continue to grow," said McCann.
"That is a tremendous surge in need," said Higgins, "It's good to see people are using the 9-8-8 number."
Commissioner Steven Dershem asked Spackman and McCann what level of training 9-1-1 dispatchers would need to be able to differentiate calls indicating a crisis or an emergency situation.
"We're very fortunate we don't get a lot of calls for people in crisis that want to talk to a counselor. I think there's a strong network already in place in Centre County through Centre Helps and other resources that most of those people call counselors directly. Our staff is all CIT trained. We train them within the first year of hire… So they'll have an idea of how to send that call," said Spackman.
"I think that our intersection happens more when we get a suicide call that is imminent risk and we need to engage 9-1-1 to get to that person. We have a process for ideally how that should happen... fortunately we are able to de-escalate 96 percent of those calls that require (9-1-1 intervention)" said McCann.
For 24/7 crisis help from Centre Helps, call 814-237-5855 or dial 988.