Dauphin County officials say during the pandemic there has been a rise in crisis intervention calls, suicides and drug overdoses; multiple departments are working together to tackle the problem. Officials in Dauphin County say the increase in Crisis Intervention calls shows there s a need for services to be expanded. Commissioner George Hartwick is one of many people trying to make it happen. How are we going to respond? How are we going to meet people where they re at and what is it that we can do differently? says Dauphin County Commissioner George Hartwick.Commissioner Hartwick says overdoses are up 13% as well as the number of people coming into the intervention services offices, telling us those visits are currently up to approximately 700-800 people per month. Expanding services cannot be done by one agency alone, it must be a partnership, says Hartwick adding, one of the critical ones are right with law enforcement to be able to be there when there s a crisis situatio
Updated: 7:06 PM EST Dec 23, 2020 By Tom Lehman Harrisburg is expanding a program that pairs city police officers with civilians trained to help people who may be experiencing a mental health crisis. We get a suicidal call from the person, from the family saying that their family member is suicidal,” said Liz Manning.Manning is a co-responder. She accompanies officers who are also trained in crisis intervention, but she’s the only co-responder assigned to the Harrisburg Police Department.Capt. Dennis Sorenson said the city is planning to fund two more full-time co-responders to help deescalate situations in which the presence of law enforcement could make things tenser. If you have multiple people there who have the same skill set, it increases our chances of getting them the help they need without anybody getting hurt,” he said.Co-responders operating through the Dauphin County District Attorney’s Office can also help people in crisis get connected to the s