Hanif questions 988 mental health crisis line impact during outage
Hanif asks whether 988 was affected and if mental health crisis callers were among those impacted. Chief Napolitano explains if someone called 988 and stayed with 988, there was no impact, but if 988 transferred to 911, it could have been affected. They don't have figures but will investigate.
Large emergencies.
We didn't have to create any new jobs as a result of that contact.
They had received the services that they needed at the time.
And I ask because, you know, I'm not like, I'm not, I've been very critical of the 911 system, particularly as it pertains to when...
Calls are answered and in instances when police have shown up resulting in
a New Yorker with disabilities or a mental health crisis getting shot and killed.
So I certainly have a lot of, I grapple with the challenges of the system that we rely on as our first kind of line of
what to do when there's an emergency.
While at the same time, I know that while 988 is a critical initiative that we want to make sure is universally known and used by New Yorkers,
to understand if among those callers were people who were in real mental health crisis and did not get the help that they needed and whether 988 was affected.
Is that something that you all are aware of or
How much do you know in terms of if 988 was used for dispatch?
I think Chief Napolitano would be happy to speak to that in terms of the difference between 911 and 988.
If someone called 988 and it's stead with 988, it didn't turn into emergency, then that obviously had no impact.
If the 988 operator now believed that this is an emergency and needs to connect to 911,
Technically, it's possible that that could have been impacted.
We don't have the figures on that, but it is possible.
We'll ask the question, Councilmember, following this.
I appreciate that.