Bob Chiarelli wants police to partner with the Royal Ottawa Hospital on mental health calls

Mayoral candidate Bob Chiarelli is proposing changes to the way the Ottawa Police Service handles mental health calls.

Chiarelli, who was Ottawa’s mayor from 2001 to 2006 and has served as a Liberal MPP in Queen’s Park, told this newspaper’s editorial board on Monday that he wants the Royal Ottawa Hospital to partner with the police.

“I believe we have not been well-served by the system when there are 911 wellness calls,” Chiarelli said. “The current situation needs to be significantly improved for the safety and security of both the police and the people who are involved in the dangerous situations that police are called in for.”

Chiarelli said his proposal would involve the creation of a group of mental health professionals who would attend emergency calls alongside police.

“I proposed that we created a partnership between the Ottawa Police Service and the Royal Ottawa Hospital whereby the ROH puts together a roster of perhaps 10 to 15 mental health professionals who can be called upon to join the police response,” he said. “The mental health professional(s) from the list (would be) available at the time of the call. We put on a vest to identify them clearly and go to the scene of the incident. Protocols would have been developed on how the team handles often dangerous situations.”

The OPS currently has a mental health unit that has existed for more than 20 years. Its officers work with mental health nurses from The Ottawa Hospital on calls where people are known to have had prior mental health emergencies. They link members of the public with community resources and support systems, during and following a crisis, according to the OPS.

In late 2020, the force announced it would invest $1.5 million into a new, community-led mental health response strategy, partly in response to criticism it received over the 2016 death of Abdirahman Abdi, a 37-year-old Somali Canadian with a history of mental health issues. Abdi died after a violent confrontation with police.

Asked about the feasibility of having mental health professionals available during a healthcare worker shortage, Chiarelli pointed to Toronto, which has already begun dispatching nurses and mental health professionals to some calls for people in crisis and said it has worked with the RCMP in Ontario’s north.

“It’s not creating new ground here. It’s been done,” he said.

Chiarelli said he had consulted with former police chiefs: “This was done with some consultation and not just out of my hat,” he said.

The Royal Ottawa Hospital did not respond to a request for comment.

The OPS responds to thousands of mental health calls each year, the according to a document delivered to the police board last year. The service had been developing a Mental Health Response Strategy in conjunction with mental healthcare and addictions professionals, and community-based organizations to improve outcomes for those with mental health problems.

Mayoral candidate Mark Sutcliffe has pledged to sit on the Ottawa Police Services Board and ensure every Ottawa region is represented on the board. But Chiarelli told this newspaper he wouldn’t sit on the board. “My sense is there should be some independence between the senior political person (and the police board),” he said.

Candidate Catherine McKenney (who uses the pronouns they/them) has called for more “effective policing,” saying that police budgets should be set based on evidence and what actually works to reduce crime.