(COLORADO SPRINGS) — In previous coverage, FOX21 News has highlighted the need for more funding for departments across the city, such as the Colorado Springs Fire Department (CSFD) as the city continues to see rapid growth. Now, more funding is needed to keep a crucial unit up and running, which responds to mental health-related calls, before the funding is set to expire by next summer.
The Community Response Team (CRT) is a unit that consists of one CSFD paramedic, a CSPD officer, and a mental health technician. The program has been up and running for eight years, and responds to calls that present high mental health challenges. The CRT aims to help get folks the proper care they need without allocating more resources than needed, according to Fire Chief Randy Royal.
“Previously we used to transport all of these patients to the hospital, which wasn’t really the right place for them to be and didn’t get the right care,” Chief Royal said. “And so now, 60% of the time, we de-escalate them on scene and we’re able to leave them with family or friends.”
Chief Royal said that 25 percent of the time, CRT crews take people directly to an inpatient or outpatient behavioral health facility, and even a smaller percentage of people who need a higher level of care are medically transported to a hospital.
Because of the high volume of calls CSFD responds to daily, they have freed up more resources like engines and ambulances by implementing this program, allowing the department to continue to respond swiftly to calls that take higher priority, like wildfires or medical emergencies.
“So we’ve gone from 100 percent transport down to 15 percent, which is huge,” Chief Royal said.
It costs $400,000 a year to keep this program going. Currently, it is funded through a grant from the Colorado Behavioral Health Administration (CBHA), but due to new statutes, this funding will not be available in the future.
“It’s scheduled to run out in June of 2025 with no re-upping of that. Part of that is the Colorado Behavioral Health Administration is moving away from having any funding associated with something that’s tied to law enforcement,” Chief Royal explained. “And because we have that law enforcement officer, they’re, in the future, looking like they’re not going to be willing to fund that.”
Chief Royal said they are currently looking at other grant options, but ideally would like the funding to be sustainable long-term.
He explained the recent proposal to Colorado Springs City Council regarding CSFD taking over medical transport; if council members pass it, it could solve the issue without costing taxpayers a dime.
“The transport enterprise that we’re working on and one of our goals with that is if council ends up voting that through and we get that support, we plan to fully fund all of our community public health under the enterprise because it has a direct impact on ambulance, transport and the amount of transports that we need,” Chief Royal said. “Which frees up the resources for more critical calls.”
