ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) – Albuquerque’s department of unarmed behavioral health responders is about to celebrate three years of working in the metro. From behavioral health to wellness checks, the Albuquerque Community Safety Department (ACS) was created to alleviate the amount of 911 and 311 calls.
Story continues below
Trending: This historic Wild West-era hotel is closing its doors in New Mexico. Here’s why
Community: PHOTOS: New Mexico State Fair through the years
Space: Unmanned Boeing Starliner to land in New Mexico this weekend
Crime: Video shows moments after AFR truck get hit by drunk driver
“When officers get on scene, when a police officer gets on scene and determines that this is a better call suited for ACS, they will send it over to us. What we do is we prioritize those officer requests, and we make sure we go out there, get to that individual… so that officer can go back into the field and respond to calls as well,” said Deputy Director of Field Operations at ACS Walter Adams.
Some 911 calls get directly dispatched to ACS. The department said many calls that police would have gone to, they respond to instead by sending their social workers. Out of their overall 85,000 calls for service, the department said 85% of those calls were diverted from APD. “Meaning that typically police would have responded to those calls, now ACS is responding to those calls.”
ACS officially celebrates its three year anniversary on Saturday. The department said they’ve grown in the past few years with extra responders leading them to help with more situations. About six months ago they responded to an average of 160 suicidal ideation calls per month, now they respond to about 230 of those cases a month.
“Every year has been an evolution. Every year we’ve almost doubled in calls for service and we don’t see that stopping,” said Adams.
A year ago, they started their 24/7 operations. ACS said in May, June, and July of this year, they responded to 359 behavioral health issue calls per month and averaged 806 wellness check calls every month. They also had 1,507 calls a month for the homeless.
In May, they celebrated the opening of their new headquarters and according to the city, it is the first stand-alone headquarters for an alternative health response department in the country.
ACS said their approach has gained national recognition. “We have cities come visit us all the time to say how are you guys operating? What does your response look like?”
According to ACS, they currently have 105 employees with 50 of those being responders. They hope to hire another 25 people including some for behavioral response positions.