City of Rochester News Release
City Announces Transfer of Family and Victims Services
Office to the Department of Recreation and Youth Services; Creation of New
Crisis Intervention Services Unit Will Better Serve the Needs of the Community
(Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2020) – The City of Rochester today
announced that operation of the Family and Victims Services office has been
transferred from the Rochester Police Department to the City’s Department of
Recreation and Youth Services (DRYS), and a new Crisis Intervention Services
Unit has been created that will better serve the needs of the community.
Details regarding the new crisis intervention unit were explained by Recreation
and Youth Services Commissioner Daniele Lyman-Torres and City Council Vice President Willie J.
Lightfoot at a news conference this morning. The changes were voted on and
approved by the City Council at its monthly meeting yesterday evening.
The goal of the new Crisis Intervention Services Unit is
to create a non-law enforcement, comprehensive community response to all
homicides, as well as all calls involving mental health, domestic violence and
other related crises. The Unit will
consist of two teams: Team I will be a comprehensive homicide response team,
while Team II will deal with all mental health and domestic violence related
emergencies. Both teams will be on call 24 hours a day/seven days a week, and
will be deployed to handle emergency situations based on the call type received
by the 911 Center. In addition, the current functions of FACIT (Family Crisis
Intervention Team) and the Victims Assistance Unit (VAU) will be incorporated
into the new Crisis Intervention Services Unit to allow for additional
coordination of non-law enforcement response services.
“Plans have been underway for more than a year to develop
a system that we can now expand to allow us to handle mental health and
domestic violence related calls without automatically having to deploy police
officers to non-violent or mental health situations,” said Mayor Warren. “The
creation of this Unit will allow us to immediately mobilize crisis counselors
and social workers who are trained to handle certain medical situations, make
referrals and provide appropriate monitoring and follow-up. Our goal is to make
sure that all crisis calls are handled appropriately, and those in crisis are
given the type of care they need.”
“While this new approach cannot change anything that has
already happened in the past, we are putting protocols in place to make sure
that the same mistakes are not repeated in the future,” Mayor Warren concluded.
Funding for the new Crisis Intervention Services Unit is
made possible by the transfer of $681,100 from the RPD budget and $300,000 from
the City’s Contingency Budget.
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News Media: For
more information, contact Jessica Alaimo at (585) 484-1850.