
A pilot project is in the works that will provide the Chico Police Department – criticized for its lack of crisis intervention efforts in the past – with two mobile mental health counselors to work alongside police officers 10 hours a day.
The program is described in a Nov. 27 memorandum, written by Butte County Department of Behavioral Health Director Dorian Kittrell to the county Board of Supervisors and obtained by ChicoSol.
Kittrell said his department is working on a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Chico PD to assign two full-time mental health workers to the pilot mobile crisis response team, which will operate seven days a week from about 8:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m.