RCMP commander wants to see more police mental health teams

• Share on Facebook
• Share on Bluesky
• Share on X
• Copy Link

“My goal is to greatly expand this needed service at existing locations as it is not always available, and introduce it into as many of our communities as possible.”

Support for the unhoused

Sleeping outside for a cause: Vernon pair backs homeless outreach

11h ago

Youth Mental Health Care

VJH Foundation commits $500K for Foundry North Okanagan

14h ago

Theft of Tools, Merchandise

Police searching for suspects in theft investigation

14h ago

Haugli said the program is much needed.

“If there is an inability to provide a dedicated Interior Health nurse for every call, then I want to implement a real-time information sharing model that provides our members important health information that will ensure a wholesome assessment of the person in crisis before attending the call. I want to build a sustained corporate-based infrastructure for all mental health related calls.”

The commander said mental health-related calls for service for police in Southeast District are increasing, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Year 2016 recorded 11,929 occurrences and year 2019 recorded 15,099 occurrences. That is a 21 per cent increase over a four-year period. In the first five months of 2020, we have already experienced 6,446 occurrences, and the month of May recorded the highest number of occurrences ever recorded totalling 1,456.”

For mental health-apprehensions under the Provincial Mental Health Act, he said the statistics are similar.

“2016 had a total of 2220 and 2019 had a total of 2568, an increase of 14%. There have already been 1227 apprehensions in the first five months with again the month of May recording the highest monthly number with 279.”

The commander apologized for what happened to UBCO student Mona Wang who was dragged by an officer down a hallway and had a boot put to her head during a wellness check in January.

Haugli said investigations will determine whether Cpl. Lacey Browning keeps her job or faces a criminal charge.

“As soon as the video showing a portion of the UBCO student wellness check was shared with Kelowna Detachment senior management and I, we directed that a statutory and code of conduct investigation be mandated immediately. The statutory investigation has been made a priority and will be advanced to an external police agency for review, ensuring a professional and thorough investigation has been done.

“Once this is complete, the investigative findings will be shared with Crown Counsel for their review and determination if a criminal charge should be advanced. We will provide an update when the investigative findings are shared with Crown Counsel.”

—

The following is a statement from Kelowna Mayor Colin Basran:

I stated my concerns about the incident when it came to light and that’s still how I feel – it was a very disturbing incident, as Chief Supt. Brad Haugli acknowledged during the news conference.

It was good to hear Supt. Haugli say an external police force will review the investigation and that Crown Counsel will also review the findings.

 It’s also a good thing that Ms. Wang will be provided with the findings of the internal process and if she has concerns with the findings she can have it reviewed by the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP.

We’ll see what the investigative process determines and have more to say when that is concluded.

The City Manager and I are meeting with Interior Health next week to discuss the escalating numbers of calls for assistance on mental health incidents and how best to proceed in the future. However, a new approach is going to take all levels of government and social agencies working together to address mental illness and addictions.

The City of Kelowna is an active participant in this effort and we will continue to do whatever we can within our powers to find solutions.

More and more officers and police time are spent responding to situations involving people experiencing serious mental health and addictions issues in our communities. We need more senior government funding to address social issues and to provide appropriate non-police responses for these situations.  

The real issue here is the need to re-think our systems, how they are funded and coordinated to provide the most effective response to the increasing and increasingly complex mental health needs in communities.

In 2019, the Kelowna RCMP Detachment’s 200 members responded to 3,561 Mental Health related files that resulted in 588 apprehensions under the Mental Health Act. As Supt. Haugli noted, those types of calls are up 21 per cent throughout the RCMP’s Southeast District in the past four years and is trending for a further increase this year.

We need a coordinated approach to these situations, and that requires the involvement of all levels of government to address the upstream conditions that lead to these crisis points. That is something I will continue to advocate for to the appropriate federal and provincial ministers to address, because the number of incidents is growing and what we all want to see are more effective solutions to reduce crisis responses that require police.

Police perform a difficult and critical job in our community every day. While recent events are disturbing, we need to take this and other recent incidents as a moment to reconsider how we are funding and approaching these situations and take actions to find a better way to address them.