MANSFIELD, Ohio — Twenty police officers and first responders in Richland County were recognized Friday for successfully completing 40 hours of Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training.
CIT is meant to help law enforcement officers and first responders know how to handle incidents involving people suffering with mental illness.
The program was introduced to Richland County in 2004 and has been sustained thanks to a collaborative effort by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) of Richland County, the Richland County Mental Health and Recovery Services Board, the Mansfield Playhouse, area law enforcement agencies, mental health and addiction professionals and individual advocates.
“It’s a great collaboration,” NAMI Executive Director Mary Kay Pierce said.
The training includes lessons on individual diagnosis, medications, de-escalation, as well as civil, legal and court processes.
Mark Perry, CIT instructor and Mansfield City School resource officer, said participants have the opportunity to hear from mentally ill individuals, learning how those individuals received help and how they prefer to be spoken to.
“They’re able to talk to experts in the career field and hear their perspectives, so they receive a lot of really good training,” he added.
The goal is to help keep people safe, he said, noting, “It’s much easier to deescalate somebody rather than having to go hands-on and take another method. Sometimes we don’t have that choice, but if we can deescalate that’s what we prefer to do.”
By recognizing that an individual has mental health issues, the responders can help that individual seek treatment instead of just sending him or her to jail, Pierce said. That, in turn, helps cut costs, Joe Trolian, executive director of the Richland County Mental Health and Recovery Services Board, indicated.
He said that to incarcerate an individual for a year, it costs around $28,000, whereas, if the individual is able to receive mental health treatment, that runs around $5,000.
The training also helps reduce injuries by lowering the need for responders to use physical confrontation with the individuals, he said.
Richland County has trained over 392 law enforcement officers and first responders since 2004.
Friday’s graduation ceremony, which was held at the Mansfield Playhouse, recognized the following graduates.
Mansfield Municipal Court
Mark Boggs
Mansfield Police Department
Officer Travis Stantz, Officer Ron Barnes, Officer Paul Webb and Officer Thayne Telquist
OhioHealth Hospital Security
Evan Hill and Thomas Burkett
Ontario Police Department
Officer Jeremy Mohn
Richland County Corrections Officers
C.O. Sgt. Beau James and C.O. Sgt. Mark Collier
Richland County Dispatch
Dispatcher Garrett Prise
Richland County Sheriff’s Office
Dep. Don Zehner, Dep. Joe Peters, Dep. Paige Wagner, Dep. Stacey Dittrich, Dep. Andrew Knee and Dep. Jason Shoemaker
Shelby Police Department
Dispatcher Shannon Small, Dispatcher Olivia Neumann and Officer Dale Humphrey
