The Peoria Police Department’s Social Services Unit co-responder program has been active since May.
Director Shamim Jaleel says licensed clinical social workers accompanied police on a call for the first time that month. The program, based out of the Peoria Township building on Main Street, was in development for years.
At one point, officials said the long process was caused in part by a delay in disbursement of funding from the Illinois Criminal Justice Authority (ICJIA). Later, the process of finding applicants qualified for the program through Carle Health’s Trillium Place took some time.
In fact, they’re still hiring. Jaleel says the current team is herself, one licensed clinical social worker and one data analyst, with another social worker starting in January.
A total of $5.9 million dollars in grants from the ICJIA, obtained in part through efforts by Democratic State Rep. Jehan Gordon-Booth, made the program possible.
Since May, Jaleel estimates the unit has been on the scene of around a dozen calls. She said members of the police department have her number and can call her directly to dispatch to the scene. In concept, the social workers provide a different tool to use at a crime scene, providing care for victims, or helping defuse a situation that could end in violence.
“The police team is already on scene, secured the scene, the scene is safe and we arrive after that,” Jaleel said. “And then we take on, you know, from there we get debriefed, briefed on what is happening and see where we are needed and move through in that fashion.”
For a specific example, Jaleel recalled a domestic dispute the unit responded to, where social workers comforted a mother and her daughter while negotiators tried to end a standoff with a man barricaded in a home.
“The mother and the child needed follow-up, connection to counseling,” Jaleel said. “So we were able to connect with them on that.”
Jaleel said other instances the program has assisted with include mental health crises and incidents involving minors. For these situations, the program has a large, black van outfitted specifically for this kind of work.
The mother and daughter sat with social workers in the van during the previously mentioned domestic incident.
“They were away from all those eyes,” said Jaleel, referencing a crowd of community members who had gathered beyond police barricades. “They were away from, you know, the curiosity and the crowd that was happening outside. It was a safe place, they could take their time, you know, they could just process what was happening at that moment.”
The van is one of two owned by the police department that patrol captain Paul Deeb calls a “game changer.”
“We found we can pull this out for our drone team to use in situations, these can be used for mobile interviews,” he said. “There’s just, the possibilities are almost endless with these vans.”
Speaking at an open house for the program Friday, multiple community leaders recalled Police Chief Eric Echevarria expressing a desire to create a social services unit in Peoria before he even had the position.
“Nobody told me that we had to do this. This isn’t something somebody said, ‘Hey, why isn’t the police department doing this?’” Echevarria said. “This is something we wanted to do, something I wanted to do, and I’m just so happy that I’m, you know, we’re able to bring it to life.”
Co-responder units from other cities also were present at Friday’s open house, including personnel from East St. Louis and Elgin. Echevarria said these other programs have provided guidance in the early days of forming Peoria’s program.
“We pick and choose from each other and see what works in our city,” he said.
The next steps for the program are hiring more licensed clinical social workers and continuing community outreach to raise awareness about what the social services unit is there to do. Jaleel said the location is a boon for the program, sandwiched between the city’s East Bluff and South Side.
“We see the bus, you know, coming by several times a day. It’s right there, so that will help alleviate some of the transportation barrier that some clients might have in, you know, getting to us or accessing our community space in that way,” she said. “It’s big, it’s warm and welcoming and that was the vision that we started with.”
On the goal of expanding personnel, Derrick Booth, Executive Director of Community Services for Carle Health-Trillium Place, has been partnered with the co-responder program and is handling the hiring. He said they plan to return to the legislation creating the program and see how the positions could be expanded.
“Broadening the scope means other licensed professionals that are also capable of doing that work,” he said. “Whether that could be licensed counselors, licensed therapists, licensed clinicians, you know, just beyond social work. So that way, we can open up the pool of professionals.”
At Friday’s open house, many community and regional leaders voiced their support of the program, including Peoria Mayor Rita Ali, city council member Chuck Grayeb and Gordon-Booth.
“I know that these communities, regardless of the fiscal situation that we are in, we’re going to come together and we’re going to fight to make sure that this is available,” Gordon-Booth said. “This is an available resource for this community that we love so very much for a very, very long time.”
With the program being created by funding, the long-term future may be a little uncertain, but chief Echevarria thinks the social services unit will demonstrate their value to the community.
“You show proof of concept and show that you can’t do what we do without it, right?” he said. “And then when you show that you can’t do without it, they have to support it, right?”
The Social Services Unit on Main Street in the Peoria Township building includes a space Jaleel hopes eventually will be used as a community space for local organization meetings. The office is open now, with many desks waiting to be filled.
