Though it’s been in operation less than a year, Wilmette Police Chief Michael Robinson is hailing the “real positive impact” of the department’s co-responder program.
The program pairs a social worker with a police officer to handle mental health, domestic violence and other sensitive calls. Robinson told Pioneer Press the pair had already made such a difference that he wished the program had started years ago.
“It’s been beneficial for the police and the community,” Robinson commented.
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The co-responders help take work off the plate of regular officers, reducing patrol responses on well-being checks and citizen-assist calls by 22.5%. That data point was presented by the co-responders to the Wilmette Village Board at their April 28 meeting.
“This program really allows me to spend more time with those people that need extra support,” said Carly Watson, the police officer in the co-responder pair. “An officer is a great first resource, but there’s a ton of other calls they’ve got to get to. And that’s where we really come in.”
Wilmette modeled its co-responder crew on a similar duo in Skokie, in operation since 2021.
Watson, who had served on the Wilmette police force for seven years, said she had done training for such crises before. For Kevin Ockrim, the social worker in Wilmette’s co-responder duo, the training focused more on safety and how to work alongside police.
“I don’t have a weapon,” Ockrim said. “I’m not trained in that, don’t want to be trained in that. But just stuff to keep each other safe.”
The department got lots of interest in the social worker role, Robinson said, but Ockrim stood out. He grew up near Wilmette: born in Evanston and raised in Skokie.
He got inspired by the social workers he interacted with in school, so much so that he studied social work in college. Ockrim said he stays in touch with his high school social worker. And prior to becoming a co-responder in Wilmette, he worked as a high school social worker in Grayslake.
“We work really well together,” said Watson, who is currently on family leave and due to return next month, in an interview prior to her leave. “We communicate well. We both want the same outcome.”
Usually, police will get a call about someone in crisis and make sure the situation is safe, Watson said. Then the co-responders will talk to the people involved.
In one example from early in the program, police responded to a call and determined it was mental health-based, Ockrim said. The co-responders then took charge from the officers.
“We were able to relieve them and take over the situation, and give both parent and kid therapeutic resources,” Ockrim added. “Because that’s what they needed in that moment.”
Often, they will connect the people involved with therapy with food assistance or other programs that would help them.
Robinson said the team, in tandem with another social worker, follows up with victims of domestic violence or other crimes to help guide them through the court process.
A traditional officer response to mental health or crisis situations can just put a “Band-Aid” on the issue, Robinson added, while the co-responders can spend more time getting to know the people involved. Indeed, much of the co-responder work involves following up with people and getting to know frequent callers.
Putting in that work proves critical when someone they know makes a call.
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“We find that it’s been very helpful and successful where relationships have been built, so that we can continue moving forward in that positive direction,” Watson said, rather “than having someone from a different shift who they don’t know yet, having to retell their story and their past.”
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Robinson said, the Wilmette police’s existing social worker (whose workload the co-responder program has since helped ease) saw a “several hundred percent increase” in the demand for her services.
Ockrim remembers that era, too, when people had an exceptionally hard time. Though it did not end with the pandemic.
“It’s not slowing down,” he added.
The sharp increase in the need for mental health services, along with the wave of police reforms, spurred departments nationwide to find better ways to respond to personal crises. While Skokie has taken the co-responder approach, Evanston dispatches a civilian-only force to respond to certain calls.
Amy Watson, who teaches at Wayne State University in Detroit and specializes in police handling of mental health issues, hadn’t heard about the Wilmette program before talking with Pioneer Press in December. But she has studied the various approaches, including the program in Evanston.
“The research on co-responder teams is mixed,” Amy Watson said, as some programs found less benefit than they expected. Still, co-responder teams have been found to reduce emergency-room trips.
Having teams of civilians who initially respond without police — but still coordinate with them — might better reduce the number of unnecessary arrests, she added, suggesting places that have the resources could have a co-responder team alongside a civilian response force.
Wilmette’s program is still in its early stages.
From last fall through late April, the program had handled 138 calls, most of which sorted into the check well-being category (62) or the citizen assist one (56). And of that total, the department determined that 90 stemmed from a mental health issue.
“We’re able to bring (callers) to a point where they can make it through the rest of the day or the rest of the week,” Ockrim said. “And we follow up.”