just another in a recent spike in homelessarrests. 20 percent arrested this month have been homeless. you get arrested just becauseyou're homeless. the typical long-term chronic homeless personis being put in jail a lot, because of small petty crimes, open containers, trespassing, loitering, all those kinds ofthings. columbia, south carolina, another city criminalizing homelessness. well whereare the homeless people supposed to go? the homeless end up in criminal justice systems,because there hasn't been a better alternative. i served three and a half years at the utahstate prison, so i've been homeless a little over a year now.this morning i had got outof jail, sat down like this, the officer had
pulled up on his motorcycle. he told me iwas going to jail. this was the same officer who had just taken me to jail not even 24hours ago. our homeless need long-term treatment solutions, instead of just incarcerationsand then put them, put them back in the street. just because i don't have a car, i don't havea credit card in my pocket, or change in my pocket, or a home to go, does not make mea criminal. we did a survey here -about 20,000 dollarsper person, per year, on the street, because of emergency services costs. jail time, emt runs, emergency room visits,and so when we realized we were incurring those costs anyway, there's a much more humaneand economic way in order to meet their needs.
you'd be surprised whose homeless. most peoplewho are homeless, they are running away from problems, they are running away from, youknow, drug addiction. i got molested when i was a kid, about 6-years-old, started drinkingearly age of 13. i couldn't deal with my problems. i've been homeless for the last 20 years.about 10 percent of the homeless population were chronically homeless. a chronic homelessindividual that's been homeless a year or more or four times in three years. a lot ofmental health issues, substance abuse issues. we decided to adopt a housing first model.instead of asking people to change their lives before we gave them housing, we choseto give them housing, along with the supportive services and then allow them to change theirlives if they wanted the supportive services
and then allow them to change their livesif they wanted to. we can house them for about 7,800 dollars per person, per year, forcase management and rental assistance in a housing unit. 2005, in orderto get into housing, you needed to be clean, dry, and sober, and if you fell off the wagon,then you lost your housing and case management. well, we weren'treducing homelessness. in 1998, we got kicked out because i was using drugs. we went backagain, like a routine for the last 15 years. i mean, it was hard. having a house is thestable base for everything. if you don't have a stable place to live, that's going to bethe biggest crisis on your mind every day whenyou go to bed, whereas, when you're in own
home, that whole level of stress is takenaway, and now you can focus on everything else that you need to focus on in your life.well it works, because we've come down 72 percent from our high in 2005. getting myhouse in here, literally saved my life. well they arrested me at least 18 times. endedup at the detox. so police brought me in there, i was pretty sad, i was shaking hard, butafter they moved me in here, i mean, i had towels up there, clean sheets, pots and pans,they brought me a big boxful of canned goods. he said, well, anythingyou need, call me. and i looked around and i told him, i said, no ed, i've got it fromhere. we've been able to show that if you house people properly and correctly, is thatit takes them out of the judicial system and
the recidivisim rate decreases. it's kindof like a security place for me. i know i got a place to stay, it's a good, good feeling.if i was still a homeless guy, i would have continued on, drank myself to death at thispoint. my first complete, 100 percent sober year, and it's a good start, i feel,you know? not the end of my program [laughing], but it's a good start! the ultimate goal isto eliminate chronic homelessness here in utah by the year 2015,and the results here prove that that is an achievable goal. the old approach of emergencyshelters and transitional housing has been a failure. housing first has been acceptednationally. this is the key to ending chronic
homelessness.the casper housing authorities trying out a system they first saw in salt lake city.staff say they've already seen success stories. now with the housing first, we're much moresuccessful in getting them housed and out of the criminal justice system and off thestreet, and help them integrate back into society.we're actually moving out today. it means a lot to me to have my family back in, we'reactually moving out today. it means a lot to me to have my family back in, where wecan by ourselves. it does help you if you do need to come here, everyone needs a helpinghand here and there. it is most cost-effective. we can serve more people with the same amountof dollars than if we didn't do this
program, but it's also the right thing todo. it just makes sense. i got arrested about 34 times due to drugs.over and over again. over and over and over again. i was arrested 14 times for being underthe influence of a narcotic. and no one say, this is his 14th time throughhere, your honor, for the same charge. he needs help. what if we tried something different? i've been arrested so many different times. i've had a couple of possession charges, i'vehad a couple prostitution charges. i've had
a ton of probation violations. i really can't even remember what the firstthing i got arrested for. urban drug addiction has been with us foras long as we've had cities, and so many major social problems come to the criminal justicesystem to be fixed because there isn't something else out there. but don't ask the criminaljustice system to do it all, because the only thing we really know how to do is send peopleto prison. so eventually i started living in a tent,and this is kind of my old home. this is what looks like, back here. there was an endlesscycle. it was between tent and jail for like 7 years. i've probably been booked in andout king county jail like 50 times.
it hurt to lay down, it hurt to stand up, itwas really excruciating. i came to seattlebecause i wanted to buy a large amount of oxycontins. they weren't readily available,and everybody kept offering me heroin. i turned it down for four days, and finallyi was so sick, i was puking, i had diarrhea, i was shaking. i felt like i was going to die. so finallyi caved in and i did heroin. and my addiction got out of hand, and threeor four days turned into like 9 years. belltown kind of runs between first avenueand fourth avenue. almost every other night
on the news, there was just like constantarrests happening. it goes on in the open for everyone to see.two days ago, we saw probably 40 dealers. drug addiction in belltown is rampant. police published this photo to show how manythey collected in just one week. a few times i honestly tried to just kick it on my own,but i got so sick, i was to the point where it was either i have to be on methadone andquit, or i'm going to die. i asked to speak to the sergeant, i told him nobody's ever given me a chancebefore. so, i'm sitting in this cell, and i'm already getting sick, and he comes backand he tells me, for your own good, i hope
that you make it to that methadone appointment.there's one thing you have to do for me first, is you have to talk to these people from thisnew program called the lead program, and then you're free. you can leave. i had never beengiven a chance before. the approach that we had over the last 35years or so of just arresting and putting people in prison for having serious addictions,well, we all know, intellectually, that's not the answer. we finally sat down and said,well, what we really want to do is have another option for the officer on the street, somethingother than taking them up to jail. what if you, instead, you can take them right to atreatment program. one reason it works is it costs the taxpayer'sa lot more money for them to be on the streets.
it costs a lot more money for police, it costsa lot more money for hospital visits. in the end, it's the humane, financial, smartthing to do. and that's what the lead program does, itprovides both the relief to the neighborhood, the police will come and respond to open airdrug dealing, but it also can provide relief and hope to people who have had long-termaddiction. long-term addiction literally changes thechemical makeup of your brain, and it makes it impossible for you to be anything but anaddict. i had everything that i would possibly want,a beautiful wife, two great kids.
at one time, i was making up to 185,000 dollars a year. i just loved, i love heroin, i lovethat feeling. the good times don't last. i've seen tons and tons of people get arrestedfor it, and i've been stopped and caught with drugs on me a number of times. personally,i've seen five people overdose and die. i know about 15. the last partner i workedwith overdosed and died in front of me. it was almost like this is my last chance.i can either wake up the next morning and go into treatment or i can come back here. officerwillaby, he just said, have i had enough?
so i answered an affirmative, and he was like,well let's see what we can do. drug use and abuse should primarily be treatedas a public health issue. lead is a harm-reduction program and if they do choose to be in thelead program, they will receive individualized case services, whether it be substance abusetreatment, or housing, or job training, with an understanding that breaking addiction,which can you know last for decades, is not going to be an overnight process. so it's really about meetingthe client where they are at, and trying to help with their basic needs first, and thentrying to work on substance abuse treatment. it wasn't government telling this person,this is what you need, it was the person who
had been struggling with addiction saying,this is what i need to get back on my feet, and through the skillful help of the casemanagers, we're able to customize a way out for so many people. most of the services in this city, you getlike one shot. they give you all these services, they try to help you, and you test dirty,you're fucked. they, they will, they will drop you. you know, i've relapsed, so i didn'tcall them or even go to the lead office for like two weeks, and when i walked in, my caseworker, [inaudible], was like, where have you been? and i remember this very clearly,he said, so what, what, what's next? what do we do next? i think i actually cried. forthe first time in over, like, 5 years to not
feel like somebody had given up on me. i've been working with brad just about a yearnow, and so, wherever he's at, i'll be there, and i always tell my clients that, like, whetheryou're doing great, whether you're not doing great, we're going to continue to work together.what makes us different is that, you know, we have a relationship with me, you know,actually hear their story, because a lot of our clients, you know, people don't reallycare about their story, so, respecting them and giving them dignity increases the likelihoodof change. we can use the power of the law, and not asa blunt instrument, but as a way to nudge people toward an outcome that is better forthem, that's better for the community.
my life now is amazing. i have been cleanfor like a year and a half. i'm going to college. i wake up in a house, it's not a tent anymore. 61 days ago, i was homeless, full-on in myaddiction, and today i go to meetings, i'm clean, i've been through a treatment program,and none of that would have happened without lead. a couple of our detectives that have beenworking in the belltown area for a long time, they were just saying how now it is like 90percent different, as far as like very few people out compared to what it was 2, 3, 4years ago, before lead. the lead program is now expanding from belltownthroughout the downtown core and into chinatown.
we have a lot of people in need. so we havethe resources now to go out and individually work with them. it's also been operating inskyway, it has now been replicated in santa fe, new mexico. do you want the same old, same old with thesame results? or do you want something that works? it's working here in seattle, i think it canwork anywhere. we're happy to be the example that shows that harm reduction, working hand-in-handwith law enforcement can take us into a new approach to drug crimes, and i think our nationdesperately needs that. what's one of several police shootings involvingpeople with mental illness. 18-year-old, keith
vidal, struggled with schizophrenia. he wasn'tviolent, and all they wanted was help getting him to treatment. seconds later, the officersshot and killed him. they murdered our son! for no reason! another disturbing video that raisesquestions about the treatment of the mentally ill behind bars. he would hear voices. the extraction teamrestrained him. minutes later, the 33-year-old was dead. jails are the number one mental health facilitiesacross the country. they house more mentally-ill person than versus any hospital, any psychfacilities, any anything. they're patients,
not prisoners. mental illness is the only disease that whenyou're in a crisis, the cops are called. you're having a heart attack, you don't call thepolice. people with mental illness are being criminalized instead of being provided treatment. these county jails and law enforcement, that'sthe public safety net, that's where you end up. there has to be some sort of solution, somesort of help, for people who are suffering from mental illness and become involved withthe police. jeff was the youngest of our four. he wasfinally diagnosed a paranoid schizophrenic.
when he was totally out of control and veryfrightening, i would have to call the police on him. they didn't know what to do. i would get calls all the time when i wason patrol for a person who was in a mental health crisis. i had no clue how to handleit, and i would just keep getting the repeat calls every couple days or every week, tothe same house, the same person, and i just accepted it that, well, this person's justgoing to be a repeat caller. we decided very early on that we needed toaddress folks that were non-violent misdemeanor offenders, that were truly being put in jailbecause of their illness. we knew that it was law enforcement that werefirst responders, and that they would be the
ones that would be in contact with individualsin crisis. so we decided what we would do first is trainlaw enforcement officers, 40-hour crisis intervention training. so they're trained to recognize mentalillness. when they come on somebody that's got kindof strange behavior, they're not using their command voice and the command presence likethey're taught in the academy. they realize oh, right away, that this person has a problem.we brought together a bunch of law enforcement officers from the sheriff and the san antoniopolice department, and every one of them didn't want to be there. i heard things like, i'ma cop, i'm not a social worker, i don't believe
in these hug-a-thug programs. and this isa bunch of bs. before i went through the 40-hour cit trainingmyself, i didn't have the resources on how to handle mental illness. well now, its waydifferent, you know? i have confidence that when i go into someone's home, if they areexperiencing some type of, you know, mental health crisis, that i can get them to theright facility, and then i may never hear from them again. i'm a mother, i'm a sister, i'm a friend,i'm a voter, i'm a volunteer, i'm all these people. i contribute to my community, andi have a mental illness. my diagnosis is major depression with psychotic features, dissociativeidentity disorder, and panic disorders. i've
done the presentations to cit training, andi tell them, i want to be treated the way you want your mother to be treated if shewas ever diagnosed with a mental illness. if i'm in a crisis, you know, i'm having acrisis, and i don't, i don't understand what's going on around me. get back! get back! get down! don't do it!in incidents with people who have mental health issues, it's unfortunate to see the ones thatresult in the use of deadly force, where an officer didn't have cit training and, possibly,armed with that kind of information, that kind of training, outcomes may have been different. i never knew each morning when i got up, whati might find. he began to talk about a fire
in the garage. so i thought, would he withoutknowing what he's doing, start a fire? how much danger is he in and how much dangeram i in? so i called the police and i said i'm terriblyfrightened. when they arrived, i introduced him to jeff,and in this case, they came in plain clothing. they weren't in police uniforms. now theycould have handcuffed him i guess and pulled him out, but they are taught how different thatperson is they're dealing with. so they began to talk to jeff. if they canget the person
that's ill to in their own mind, they're cooperating,it's far less violent, it's better for the patient, and certainly it's better for our police. when non-violent people go to jail with mentalillness, they stay three or four times longer than a violent offender, but if when theyget released, if they're not hooked up into treatment, they're going to be right backin. there is so many in their emergency rooms who shouldn't be there. previous police chiefhere actually kept data on how long his officers were spending in the emergency rooms waitingfor psych evals and medical clearance, 8 to
14 hours. he spent 600,000 dollars a yearon overtime. now here at the restoration center, law enforcement officers are in and out within15 minutes. what we have here at, at the restoration centeris it services patients who are in crisis. it's either walk-in or brought in here bya cit. they recognize the patients in crisis, they're not truly suicidal or they don't reallywant to hurt somebody, they just need help. there about 18,000 people a year who are brought,mainly by law enforcement officers, to this restoration center, who used to go to jailor emergency rooms or put back on the street. if you're a taxpayer and really don't knowa lot about mental illness, the fact the public's a lot safer when these people get treated,and the taxpayer's saves a ton of money.
over the last five years, we've saved about50 million dollars, in taxpayer's dollars. we want everyone trained because of the potential,daily, that someone's going to come across someone who's in crisis. it's not a matterof if, it's a matter of how soon? we've been coming up on six years, of existence,and we don't have a use of force on our, on our unit, which means we've never tased anybody,we've never shot anybody, we've never hit anybody with an asp, but patients, talkingto them, we get the result we want in the end and we don't have to force it on them.
you want cit to respond, because you're goingto get the help that you need rather than being sent to jail. the issues that police officers have withpeople who have mental illness is not unique to san antonio, that's all over the country,all over the world. so any city that would decide to focus on this, put an emphasis onthis, would certainly benefit from it. i no longer thought, what if they have toshoot jeff? we save money, we improve public safety, andpeople can get functional again. i mean, why wouldn't you do this? it's really a, a no-brainer.
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