HomeMy WebLinkAbout2.21.23 Commission on Equity and Public Safety Meeting MinutesCity of South San Francisco
Minutes of the Commission on Equity and Public Safety
Tuesday, February 21, 2022
Zoom Teleconference Meeting
6:00 pm
Committee Members:
Present: Krystle Cansino, Salvador Delgadillo, PaulaClaudine Hobson-Coard, Arnel
Junio, Carol Sanders, Steven Yee
Absent: Alan Perez
Staff Members:
Present: Amy Ferguson, Staff Liaison
Maryjo Nuñez, Management Fellow
Guests: Chief Scott Campbell, Capt. Adam Plank
_____________________________________________________________________________________
CALL TO ORDER
Meeting called to order at 6:03pm.
AGENDA REVIEW
No changes to the agenda.
APPROVAL OF MINUTES
The Minutes from the January 17, 2023, minutes were approved.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Vice Chair Junio read the Land Acknowledgement.
MATTERS FOR CONSIDERATION
1. Approval of Minutes
Commissioner Yee motioned to approve the minutes, seconded by Commissioner Hobson-Coard.
2. Presentation of scorecard for Commissioners’ use
Amy Ferguson presented the scorecard to the Commissioners, and there were no comments or
questions on Scorecard.
3. Presentation on Berkeley’s Mobile Crisis Team by Allyson Nakayama LCSW, Mental Health Program
Supervisor.
Presentation Overview and Questions
-Berkeley is one of the only cities in California that has a mental health department
-Goals and Purpose of MCT:
1) Provide first response crisis intervention and on scene consultation to BPD and other regional
police departments
2) Divert individuals with mental health disorders from the criminal justice system into
treatment
3) Reduce the impact of mental health emergencies through immediate response to crisis
situations at the street-level and through coordination and consultation with local public safety
organizations, hospitals, and other community groups.
-BMCT has access to state records bc they are part of mental health department and not police
department
Commissioner Yee wanted to ask questions in terms of community updates… when say community who
is part of that?
Allyson Nakayama: The manager’s office has been working with a senior management analyst who
works with council and Bonita House, so they have been doing outreach via flyers, to clients and family
members, having copies available in the lobbies and wellness group schedule.
-Berkeley’s model seems comparable to SSF’s model, hence why the Chair wanted the Commission to
hear about Berkeley.
Funding Information
The Mobile Crisis Team has many funding sources. Portion of medical provides reimbursement for crisis
and outreach responses and for folks who are open to the service team; can bill directly for services like
with private therapists as well.
Chair Cansino: do you guys also get dispatched by 911?
Allyson Nakayama: that is correct; have a number that folks can reach us at but also emergency 911 and
asking for mental health analysis
If mall billing needs to be from a direct client contact
Chair Cansino: Would you bill medical anyway for evaluation?
Allyson Nakayama: There can be a “hot-shot” opening, so if someone has Alameda medical, don’t have
to go mall billing… don’t do private insurance
Commissioner Yee: what is mall billing?
Chair Cansino: it’s like a general fund that behavioral health can access… because it’s difficult to identify
licensure sometimes there are more services that don’t fall under just one diagnosis, so mall billing is a
way to reallocate those funds … if no insurance and can’t bill medical or Medicare, then mall billing
comes in.
Chair Cansino: when they do go out with police, it would be behavioral health?
Allyson Nakayama: services that are provided in injunction with police, BMC are who bills for the
services; only clinicians and staff assigned to mental health billed.
Vice Chair Junio: is there 24/7 coverage for a phone service? It was one of the recommendations that
there would be a 24/7 operator, so is that an employee?
Allyson Nakayama: yes, that was a recommendation to have a 24/7 responder to answer the phone…
they have been discussions for having an actual operator but not any of the direct line staff to answer
but it is still to be determined.
Commissioner Sanders: how likely is it that those recommendations will be become policy?
Allyson Nakayama: A majority could but still to be determined…
Commissioner Delgadillo: why understaffed and have a high turnaround rate?
Allyson Nakayama: Our division has been throughout the pandemic and the worst has been a 40%
vacancy rate now down to 30%
Chair Cansino: across the nation, healthcare is understaffed and even SFPD is understaffed right now
Commissioner Delgadillo asked question on if the relations between police and the clients have
improved or if it’s been rocky?
Allyson Nakayama: because mobile crisis has been around for so long, people are aware of the
relationship and are willing to share that this resource is available… having both options available can be
a “best of both world” option.
Amy Ferguson: we are looking at what kind of model we are looking to adopt… could you go over the
strengths and weaknesses of the different components?
Allyson: responding in the moment can be helpful but due to understaffing
4. Discussion of Presentation on Berkeley’s Mobile Crisis Team
Chair Cansino thinks that if SSF will be going to go in stages, then would like BMC to be our “stage 1”
Amy Ferguson: could you explain why this would be a good stage 1?
Chair Cansino: crisis models like this hold the radio, like with Mika, go out with teams of 2, so could have
someone else; really like how they do mall billing because it ensures that revenue is still coming in and
helps with reallocation of funding; this seems the most attainable… they don’t have the FD which costs
more and don’t have doctors which costs more; not as complicated as Alameda County. Going into
crisis, there is a lot more to think of than just responding to the public; but like defining what a crisis is:
mental health, cognitive, etc.
Commissioner Yee: there is efficiency and there is effectiveness, so appreciates the input from Chair
Cansino. But how are people clearly communicating their effectiveness of the program—is there
consistency with the models? There was a lot of data, but what is the data on outcome?
Vice Chair Junio: that data is probably going to come from the police.
Chair Cansino: a crisis isn’t necessarily a crime, so can’t use arrest data per se… Also, not just the nature
of calls, but things like how many are accessing ER for behavioral vs. medical? When looking at services,
it is a system thing. We need to look at how many are repeat callers; how many were able to get linked
to services?
Commissioner Yee: what do we want to achieve for the community? What is the experience that we
want? Is it trust of police; is it happiness—I think happiness is a worthwhile metric—all these activities
that can lead to community wide values are important.
Amy Ferguson: The Gardner Center does probably have more data that we can delve into.
Chair Cansino: When looking at how to expand the pilot, let’s look at the original goals of the pilot to see
what data we need and what recommendations we can make.
Presentation of Data on the Community Wellness and Crisis Response Team by Captain Adam Plank, SSF
Police Department and Jaymes Pyne, John W. Gardner Center at Stanford University. 6
5. Recess
6. Presentation of Data on the Community Wellness and Crisis Response Team by Captain Adam
Plank, SSF Police Department and Jaymes Pyne, John W. Gardner Center at Stanford University
Questions from Commissioners
Commissioner Yee: is the hour blocks corresponding to the 9-5 business day?
Capt. Adam Plank: if broken down further, would be difficult to read, so started with 9am and ended
with 5pm chunks
Commissioner Yee: is this speaking to the number of unique individuals?
Capt. Plank: this slide does not differentiate between multiple 5150s in the same age range.
Commissioner Yee: in the other end of the spectrum, those over 59, are there any insights for the age
range that is distinctive for each group? Do you see any changes over time?
Capt. Plank: no change in time.
Commissioner Yee: there is a data subcommittee and the data on race surprised us… any commentary
for the white residents compared to other groups?
Capt. Plank: data is not consistent with census totals for demographics of SSF; the population of White
residents was 22% so that ends up being 12% higher on the information shown for 2022, and none of
them were accurate representations of the city’s demographics.
Vice Chair Junio: are these persons who identified themselves as “white” or was it based on the police
filing out the forms themselves?
Capt. Plank: it is the police writing the reports
Commissioner Yee: when identified non-SSF residents, what kind of coordination is at play?
Capt. Plank: the coordination would fall when they are at the psychiatric services
Chair Cansino: this would be more of a question for behavioral health
Commissioner Yee: At this point bc the sample size is not significant yet to make any meaningful
commentary yet?
Jaymes Pyne: this is a pilot program, so this is ramping up so things might change over time… now
maybe we can say we’ve worked the bugs out, but we also need to find out how the program has
changed over time. Some of it is letting it evolve.
Commissioner Yee appreciates the decision-making workflow.
Chair Cansino: considering that a big number was Hispanic, how are we as a city making sure that we
have people who can help translate to help explain what is happening to them?
Capt. Plank: we have a variety of officers who can speak many different languages, and they can be
called. Also, there are other police departments nearby from San Bruno, Pacifica, Daly City to help us
with translation. Mika’s iPad also has a direct translation line which covers almost every language
available, even sign language.
When the Commission did a tour, Chair Cansino noticed that they have a section for the officers’ own
mental health… she asked: can the officers also use Mika?
Capt. Plank: currently, have not utilized her as a resource in that capacity, but there are still resources
available for officers
Chair Cansino: would like to see more Spanish language services. She would also like to know how many
did not result in a 5150, which is an important way to determine if this is working.
8. Updates from Staff on future meetings
-Brown Act changing, so meetings will be in person: probably in City Hall’s Conference Room.
-DEI officer is interviewing, so will most likely come on in April (prefer a weekend in April for the retreat)
-Amy just heard from CAHOOTS; holding info sessions and the first one is this Thursday
-viewing sessions in subcommittees
-out of all the presentations, Chair Cansino would like SSFPD to present on what their recommendations
would be to see how the Commission could help SSFPD
-this coming Friday, Chief has a meeting to talk about long time sustainability, so looking at sources of
funding and to determine if will just be SSF or SMC wide… it might be more beneficial in the long run to
have a North County initiative that way it’ll increase availability
-Chair Cansino thinks it would be great if SSF could spearhead this effort
-Commissioner Hobson-Coard’s band will be performing at Fort Mckinley at March 5th starting at
8:00pm.
ADJOURNMENT
The meeting was adjourned at 8:38 PM.