RCMP feel like ‘the sole option’ for many NWT mental health calls

Some police officers in small Northwest Territories communities say they are the only resource to deal with people having mental health emergencies.

Last month, Cpl Jason Doucet sat in a Fort Smith town council meeting and described a short-staffed detachment with three out of eight positions vacant, trying to keep pace with everything it needs to do.

One such responsibility is compliance checks on several “high-risk offenders” released in the town on bail, Doucet said. Another is handling what he called a “high number” of calls that, if not directly related to mental health, “have a mental health component” to them.

“My guys are in the process of responding to one of them right now,” he said as the meeting continued, “with someone that needs help badly.”

RCMP in the NWT say they respond to more than 120 calls a month that are classified as being related to mental health.

That classification “indicates that the complainant reported that someone was suffering from a mental health crisis, and usually the caller is concerned and asking the police to check on them and see what services they might need,” said RCMP spokesperson Cpl Matt Halstead.

“These calls are often time-intensive and tie up our officers for hours at a time, depending on the outcome.

“In the absence of other programs within the Northwest Territories for remote response to mental health-related issues, the RCMP becomes the sole option to provide assistance.”

Halstead said he had spoken with Fort Smith detachment commander Sgt Cagri Yilmaz, who had indicated that the level of such calls could “sometimes put strain on resourcing.”

Yilmaz believes the town detachment has enough staff to carry out police duties, Halstead added, though it could do “more proactive work with additional officers, and this is true of everywhere.”

Departments working on the issue

The NWT government doesn’t control what RCMP do in the territory, though the GNWT does get to regularly issue sets of priorities to police each year.

At the moment, those priorities are:

• disrupting the illicit drug and alcohol trade;
• strengthening relations with Indigenous communities;
• providing services “that are responsive to the needs of Indigenous women, girls, families, and children experiencing family, intimate partner, and sexualized violence in the NWT;” and
• improving “community knowledge and understanding about local policing services.”

RJ Simpson set those priorities as justice minister in Caroline Cochrane’s government. Having succeeded Cochrane as premier, Simpson has since said he wants to work on how police respond to mental health calls in the territory.

At an NWT Association of Communities meeting in early March, Simpson was asked if the territorial government is looking to add social workers to help police address mental health-related calls, similar to the Yukon government’s Car 867 partnership, which pairs police officers with nurses from Yukon’s Mental Wellness and Substance Use Services unit.

“Often it’s not a crime that they’re responding to, it’s a mental health issue,” Simpson acknowledged. 

“When the RCMP show up, they don’t know that. They don’t have this person’s medical records. They don’t know if they’re having mental health issues or they’re not, and that changes how you approach the situation.”

Simpson said he had spoken with the territory’s chief superintendent, Syd Lecky, who previously worked at the Kamloops detachment where a similar program existed. 

“They’re very open to that, so it’s just a matter of us putting that into motion,” the premier said.

Lecky has since accepted a position in Timmins, Ontario. His last day leading NWT RCMP will be in early May, and an interview with him for this article could not be arranged by the time of publication.

Ngan Trinh, a spokesperson for the NWT’s Department of Justice, said RCMP had raised the idea of additional mental health response supports with departmental staff.

In turn, Trinh said, the department works with a local community justice committee to identify policing priorities for places like Fort Smith. For the past year, RCMP in Fort Smith say the town’s specific priorities have been road safety, reconciliation and community engagement, and harm reduction.

Trinh said similar concerns had been raised by other communities and the department is working closely with the Department of Health and Social Services to address the issue.

‘No one else can do the job’

At last month’s Fort Smith council meeting, Doucet gave the example of some provinces that employ teams of psychiatric nurses to assist officers when responding to mental health-related calls.

Doucet said when Fort Smith officers contact the nursing station or a mental health worker, they’re told unless a person “proactively reaches out to them for help, their hands are tied.”

“In other parts of the country … they proactively reach out to the people that need it. I don’t think we have the call volume to trigger a response like that, but we should think about something else … we should think about health and social [services] reaching out to these people,” he said.

Not all of the calls even need a police response, Doucet added, “but we’re de-facto contacted because no one else can do the job or their hands are tied. Sometimes, our presence with the uniforms escalates things.”

Fort Smith doesn’t have on-call mental health workers on the weekends. Umesh Sutendra, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Services, said the town has one regional manager for mental health and addictions, two community counsellors, one child and youth counsellor and two wellness workers (with one of those positions currently vacant).

“Our service model, staffing and funding is based on operations during regular business hours,” Sutendra said by email.

“Anyone who required assistance outside of these hours would be assisted either by presenting to the emergency department or calling one of the available over-the-phone or virtual supports for mental health and wellness.”

Simpson’s government is still finalizing its mandate for the period between 2023 and 2027 – the document that will guide what the GNWT actively prioritizes.

The territory’s 19 MLAs, Simpson included, have already set four basic priorities to guide that mandate.

Two of the four priorities are access to healthcare and addressing the effects of trauma, and safe residents and communities.

At the March meeting with NWT community leaders, Simpson said he would place a “heavy focus on ensuring the RCMP have the legislative tools” and staff to address a broad range of issues.

“I am focusing quite a bit on the RCMP this government,” he said.

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