CARMEL – An initiative that provided mental health services to individuals in crisis throughout Putnam County is now in jeopardy since members of the Sheriff’s Department who had joined employees from the Department of Mental Health and Social Services in responding to such emergencies, will no longer be doing so as of June 30.
Since 2024, when a crisis call came in, a CRT member from each department responded together in an unmarked vehicle to provide support and help de-escalate the situation.
Sheriff Bran Hess told the Legislature’s Protective Services Committee that while “mental health calls are an ongoing crisis not only in Putnam but around the U.S., they place real demands on law enforcement.”
Hess called mental health services “important. The question facing us is whether to assign a full-time sworn deputy to the CRT model as the most responsible use of Sheriff’s Office resources.”
The CRT program began with a federal grant obtained during the late Kevin McConville administration. The funding covered a mental health professional, training, and equipment, but not the salary or other costs of a deputy sheriff.
Hess said a deputy’s salary, benefits, training and equipment costs Putnam taxpayers $250,000 a year, however, “the data does not support continuing the assignment in its current form.”
Hess told lawmakers that the CRT handled only three percent of the county’s mental health calls, which averaged 90 a year. “This is not a criticism of mental health professionals nor is it criticism of the deputies taking part in the program. They served professionally and with compassion. This is a question of structure, governance and operational efficiency,” he said.
Legislator Nancy Montgomery said the legislature was willing to distribute funding for resources and personnel to keep the program going.
Legislator Erin Lee Crowley added, “I know the people that work in this unit. It disheartens me to see that we are disbanding it. Having trained professionals respond to a scene in a less aggressive manner helps to de-escalate a situation, and keep everyone calm.”
Sheriff Hess said his department will continue to “support mental health responses by working with the Department of Mental Health and Social Services, EMS and the county’s leadership. We are still open to helping build a better model, one that is behavioral health led, properly governed and supported by law enforcement when safety requires.”
On Thursday, Commissioner of Social Services and Mental Health Sara Servadio said the co-responder model was based on a simple but important principle: “Public safety and compassionate crisis response can work together. By pairing law enforcement officers with trained mental health professionals, the program improved outcomes for people in behavioral health crises while increasing safety for everyone involved.”
Servadio added that mental health professionals were “able to provide immediate clinical assessment, de-escalation, and connection to services, while officers were supported in managing extraordinarily complex and often unpredictable situations. This partnership reduced unnecessary hospitalizations and arrests, increased access to care, and allowed individuals in crisis to be treated with dignity and respect.”
She noted that the program showed public safety and mental health intervention are closely linked, not competing priorities. “When trained professionals respond together, outcomes improve for everyone involved. The community’s challenges have not eased, and the need for a specialized crisis response remains strong,” said the commissioner.