Film/Video

Heart: Serving our neighbors in crisis

Yewande Addie, MPH¹, Hannah Hamza², Yewande Addie, PhD, MPH¹, Brittany Wood¹, Markeith Gentry¹, Brian Aagaard, MA¹, Adam Booher³, Jordan Baese³ and Dan Schneider⁴
(1)RTI International, Durham, NC, (2)Durham, NC, (3)Chapel Hill, NC, (4)Raleigh, NC

APHA 2023 Annual Meeting and Expo

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder, and a historic summer of unprecedented unrest, leaders across the country were confronted with public pressure to defund police and contend with a history of police violence and community fear. This moment in time was underscored by the declaration of racism as a threat to public health and acknowledgement of the relationship between public safety and health equity. In response, a coalition of multiple cities in North Carolina began researching solutions grounded in the reality that police alone cannot meet every crisis response need. After an RTI study revealed that many of the 9-1-1 calls coming into Durham’s emergency dispatch system were for nonviolent incidents, the City of Durham decided to pilot the Durham Community Safety Department (DCSD), an alternative crisis response program. Better known locally as HEART - the Holistic Empathetic Assistance Response Team is the city's first public safety unit to be staffed with mental health clinicians, peer support specialists, and EMTs. HEART: Serving Our Neighbors in Crisis, is a documentary that details the pilot process and explores the deep collaboration needed for police officers, mental health clinicians and peer specialists to work together responding to community needs with care.