Behavioral Health Division

AGENCY FIRST

Brandi Wisniewski Administrative Assistant Thomas McNeese, PhD. Psychologist

Robert Seals, PhD. Psychologist & Director Harry Mergel, LPC, LMFT, CEAP, M.MFT, Counselor Jeff Manzer, M. Ed, LPC, NCC, Counselor

The Harris County Sheriff’s Office started the Behavioral Health Division in January 2020. This is the first such division in the agency’s history. The division’s mission is to provide evidence-based behavioral health consultation, outreach, education, and con‐fidential mental health services to HCSO employees and their eligible dependents in order to de‐crease the stigma of mental illness, provide support for mental or behavioral health ill‐ness/problems, help provide and improve coping skills, and advance employee morale, productivity, and longevity.

For 2021, the division had 1081 clinic visits. Clinic services include consultation, evalua‐tion, individual/couples counseling, depres‐sion/anxiety/PTSD treatment, alcohol/sub‐stance abuse counseling, and referrals. They conducted 145 wellness checks. These are provided regularly to per‐sonnel in high-exposure assignments, such as homicide. They responded to 63 incident responses (on-scene support of impacted in‐dividuals) and conducted 34 post critical in‐cidents visits (debriefing visits in the imme‐diate aftermath of a critical incident). The division had 3,324 classroom contact hours and 130 outreach events.