e sse nt i al nonprofit
Decriminalization of Mental Illness
in Dane County
by Bobbie Jo Disch On Monday, September 27, Dane County Executive Joe Parisi announced $10 million in funding to construct the Dane County Crisis Triage Center (CTC) as part of his 2022 budget. Joe is also creating a brand-new division within the county government, the Division of Behavioral Health, to oversee these new changes. CTC will follow the creation of the Community Alternative Response Emergency Services (CARES) team. Both will work together toward the decriminalization of mental illness, aiming to work together to deter and limit the involvement of armed law enforcement and the criminal justice system for individuals who are experiencing a mental health crisis. The CTC and CARES teams are part of a 14-part reform package that was announced by Sheila Stubbs and Analiese Eicher in June 2020. Analiese, Dane County board supervisor who 32 | m a d i s o n e s s e n t i a l s
helped create this reform package, describes the package as “a result of years of data-driven recommendations put into action.” Dane County Sheriff Barrett describes the reform package as rethinking the criminal justice system. He emphasized the importance of “not doing things just because that was how we had done them in the past.” Analiese cites this rethinking of the criminal justice system as being sparked by the Black Lives Matter movement and the COVID-19 pandemic. She described the Dane County community as always caring about issues of change; however, after seeing the basic needs of their neighbors becoming threatened, many community members saw change in our community as increasingly more important. Overall, the hope for this reform package is that it will result in a healthier community where individuals struggling with mental and behavioral
health issues can find healthcare instead of finding themselves involved in the criminal justice system. CTC will be a comprehensive facility that will allow individuals to receive help by obtaining a referral from other partners, being brought in directly by law enforcement, or by walking in themselves. Sarah Henrickson, clinical team manager and first embedded crisis worker, describes this model as having “no wrong doors.” CTC will be filling a large gap in mental health care, as it will allow for a place to go other than an emergency room for an individual in crisis. Often, an individual in crisis will be aware that they are in need of immediate help, but other behavioral health interventions can take days or even weeks. On the other hand, the emergency room can seem inappropriate and intimidating. CTC will fill this gap by creating high-quality emergency
