Milford City Council recently heard an update on the Behavioral Health Unit from Jenna Haynes
At a recent meeting, Chief Cecilia Ashe introduced Jenna Haynes to Milford City Council. Hayes is the Behavioral Health Director for the Milford Police Department.
“As I indicated in previous months, I’m going to kind of switch things up here a little over the next couple of months, to start to highlight different parts of the department that are kind of a behind the scenes,” Chief Ashe said. “I want to give you a glance at the great work that our civilian staff, along with our sworn staff, is conducting.”
Haynes told council she was a licensed clinical social worker and that she had been with the department since 2021. She also provided details on the reports provided to council and explained various parts of the statistics.
“How we do it is our clinicians each capture this information, and then at the end of the month, whatever their last shift of that month is, they send it to me, and then I compile it into one report. So, we do capture some other more clinical side stuff that isn’t necessarily relevant for this, but this is for our purpose of sharing with you guys,” Haynes said. “This is some relevant things. So, we capture the hours worked every week. How many hours and that includes if we attend any meetings or host any meetings, that’s predominantly me, just because I’m here during day shift. And then any trainings that we attend or host, and that can include the Narcan trainings that we attend across the city. And then we capture new statistics, which looks at individuals, new contacts, and whether that is an officer sends us information for after the fact, or we’re riding along, so we do capture those individually.”
Once the number of new contacts is determined, the staff looks at where they initiated, whether it was a call for service, domestic violence, check the welfare or mental illness referrals. Haynes stated they also collect information on diversions from ER and arrest.
“A diversion from an ER is either a person that an officer would have sent to the emergency room if one of our clinicians wasn’t there to more formally evaluate them. And it also captures individuals that we are able to send directly to a psychiatric facility instead of the emergency room, because we know that the emergency room are overrun right now. They are overrun with everything, and they’re not always the best place for someone with psychiatric concerns to go. So, if we can get them directly into a facility where they’re getting mental health care immediately, that’s always great,” Haynes said. “And then diversions from arrest, obviously looks at someone that is diverted into a treatment of some form in lieu of arrest.”
Haynes further explained that diversion from ER or arrest was based on each individual the unit dealt with and that each person was followed up on by her staff on a weekly basis. The members of the unit do brief case management and create timelines for how often follow up is necessary based on each person’s situation.
“We did apply and get a grant, which I’m sure Chief Ashe has talked about, to get new clinicians. So, with that, we’ve increased hours with our two current part timers. We had hired a third, and we’ve actually just started the process for hiring a fourth, so four in addition to me, so that’s five,” Haynes said. “What’s really great about that is, when we get this last individual onboarded, she just needs to do some of her security trainings, but when we get her on board, that’ll be seven day a week coverage, which is awesome. Not 24/7 obviously, but seven days a week, so that someone is here until at least nine or 10 o’clock at night during the week, and then on weekends, someone should be here till about seven or eight at night, depending on the schedule. So that’s great that we’ll have seven day week coverage with minimal overlap.”
Some of the clinicians work weekends while others are on the schedule during the week. The current members of the unit include Danielle Blackwell, Greg Bissette and Alyssa Lucas with a fourth coming on board in a few months in addition to Haynes.
“I also think it’s important to highlight Jenna’s amazing talent, and the fact that we were able to get her is a miracle in itself. She is recognized on the national level now based off of the work that she’s doing, she’s being asked to speak on a national platform dealing with behavioral health units and how you can basically start these units and get them up and running,” Chief Ashe said. “And Milford is being highlighted on a national level because of the work and commitment that she has put forth in this program, so just making sure that we’re recognizing her and all of the clinicians for the awesome work they are doing.”
Councilman Jason James commended the unit on the work they were doing in the city. Councilman James along with former Chief Kenneth Brown, were instrumental in bringing the unit to the department.
“Jenna may remember that when Chief Brown and I were working trying to get this program up and running, Jenna was one of the prizes that we were trying to get, and we were afraid that we weren’t going to get her, because there was competition trying to get her,” Councilman James said. “And I remember when this program started, it was Jenna’s gonna do it right from the beginning. We’re gonna get her comfortable with the officers, see if they can adapt to a presence of another person riding with them.
Councilman James continued, calling the Behavioral Health Unit a success story.
“The whole idea was, when there’s a call that does not require arrest, who shows up? Police are trained to do certain things. They’re very good at critical incidents, training, all of that. But when it’s behavioral health, which includes mental health, drug addictions and all the like it’s behavioral health, then you need a clinician who’s trained in that specialty to be able to address those individuals,” Councilman James said. “And then diversions from arrest, and then diversions from ER were actually things that were also very valuable, because part of the payback, as it was sold at the time, obviously, part of the payback was it would save some of the police officers’ from spending time sitting in the ER when they could be out doing other work. So, I thank you for all that you’ve done. Thank you for the growth of this department and Chief, thank you for, once again, elevating and making it great as it is, much appreciated.”
Haynes stated that it was a great program and that the feedback she had received was extremely positive.
“You have to have trust with the community. I can toss out a million statistics, but if you ask that one family member or that one individual that got into treatment, that’s groundbreaking for them. Sometimes I look at these numbers and I’m like, ‘Oh, I feel like I did so much more.’ But some of these complaints sometimes take hours of your time. It’s not just an in and out thing, but definitely of the community I have encountered, I have gotten great feedback,” Haynes said. “When I first started, I really had to separate and say “I’m not a cop, I’m not a cop, I’m not a cop.’ They were like, ‘You look the same as a cop, you got out of the same car,’. So they’re not looking at my details and noticing ‘Oh, she’s not wearing a gun.’ They see I’m wearing a vest and I got out of a cop car. So trying to explain in the beginning to the community, ‘Hey, I’m not a cop,’ and letting them know we’re here to help you.”
In addition to acceptance from the community, Haynes explained that the unit also had acceptance from the officers.
“They have no problem taking me back out to follow up with someone standing there. So, they’re really great about also saying, like, ‘well, maybe this isn’t working. Let’s get Jenna in here, even if it’s tomorrow or the next day.’ So, they’ve been really great about that with me and with our other clinicians,” Haynes said. “So, I really appreciate their work. It wouldn’t be possible without them and their willingness. And in the beginning, they were like, ‘she’s going to write the paperwork. We’ll take it. ‘That was the only like sell that I had to make. But now we’ve come a long way since then. So they’ve done great work.”
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