GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ)- Two Green Bay Officers received a state wide award Thursday for their work with mental health.
Officers Barb Gerarden and Kamra Allen were awarded the Sir Robert Peel award at the KI Convention Center in Green Bay Thursday afternoon.
The officers have made a difference with a alternative approach to policing. Allen says Crisis Response Oriented Policing is more about helping rather than just arresting.
“With mental health, it’s a whole new way of viewing calls and helping people” she said.”Before we were bringing someone to jail, now we are trying to bring them into a treatment center.”
The Green Bay Police Department added the full-time mental health positions in early 2017.
The Sir Robert Peel award honors projects that have made a significant impact in the community. Gerarden says through support from the community, their efforts have increased.
“It’s a true blessing that we get to be part of this. I got into law enforcement to help people, and we have been able to work a full time mental health position which a lot of agencies do not have that.
The purpose of the initiative is to get those people they encounter suffering from a mental illness, the help they need, rather than making them feel like a criminal.
Allen says the department uses the philosophy of Sir Robert Peel in their work.
“Sir Robert Peel says the the public are the police and the police are public, and we could not have worked on any of these issues without having community partners.”
Gerarden says since it has been a focus, the department has encountered many situations where intervention was better than an arrest.
“There are days when it feels like 80 percent of the calls have a mental health component, and other days it is more like 20 percent.
Main areas of focus have been the emergency detention process, using mental health court as a jail diversion and collaborating with adult protective services.
