The City Council Tuesday approved a recommendation to redeploy a Harbor Area alternative response program to a different facility, which city officials say would better serve the community.
The move comes after Councilman Tim McOsker, who represents the 15th District, which includes San Pedro, Watts, Harbor Gateway, Harbor City, and Wilmington, introduced a motion on Sept. 8 seeking to move the Therapeutic Van Pilot Program from Fire Station 40 on Terminal Island.
McOsker sough to move the program out of Terminal Island because it is not easily accessible and would become even more difficult to access with the future Vincent Thomas Bridge Deck Replacement Project.
According to a report from the Los Angeles Fire Department, there were two possible facilities to move the program to — the county’s Department of Mental Health San Pedro Clinic, located at 150 W. 7th St. or the city’s Fire Station 36, located at 1005 N. Gaffey St.
Ultimately, the fire department recommended that the program be redeployed at Fire Station 36 because it was a larger space compared to the health clinic.
The report stated that the move will take some time due to a lack of power. The city’s Department of General Services will need to make some electrical modifications, but no set date has been determined.
In addition, McOsker is looking to refine the program by testing some “kind of direct communications link” between responders and the fire department, as well as the Los Angeles Police Department.
LAPD will also analyze the 911 calls in an effort to better understand what calls should be diverted to an alternative response.
The Therapeutic Van Pilot Program is a partnership between the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health and the Los Angeles Fire Department, which utilizes the DMH’s therapeutic transport response in conjunction with the fire department’s Tiered Dispatch System for call involving patients with mental health crises.
It provides mental health patients with immediate therapeutic support from DMH staff and is part of a “panacea of the city’s evolving unarmed model of response for those experiencing mental health crisis,” according to McOsker’s motion.
City officials launched the pilot program with the county in January 2021. The program was designed for a year. Earlier this year, the city approved to reinstate the program and extend the service through June 30, 2024.
L.A. County owns the therapeutic vans and provide staff from the DMH’s Psychiatric Mobile Response Team. The teams are available 24 hours a day and deployed from LAFD stations.
The program also services downtown L.A., South L.A., West L.A. and the San Fernando Valley.