LA moves forward with plan to create an Office of Unarmed Response

Los Angeles took the first steps toward creating an Office of Unarmed Response with the approval of a motion Tuesday by the City Council.

Considered the beginning of an effort to develop alternative responses to some emergency calls, the motion instructs some city departments to create a framework of what the Office of Unarmed Response will look like. That framework is based on scope of work, funding, staffing and determining primary objectives.

Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez introduced the motion alongside council members Nithya Raman, Marqueece Harris-Dawson and then-Councilman Mike Bonin. The council approved the motion on a 12-0 vote.

"This motion is the beginning of that work, and it is reflective of all the contributions that members have made,'' Rodriguez said.

The motion in part instructed the chief administrative officer to develop within the next 120 days a performance management and evaluation program of the city's Unarmed Model of Crisis Response Pilot -- with data from that study to be used to guide the formation of the Office of Unarmed Response.

The Council also instructed the Los Angeles Police Department to report back within 90 days with a list of 911 calls that could appropriately be diverted to alternative response models rather than armed police officers.

Councilman Bob Blumenfield, who chairs the council's Budget and Finance Committee, noted that the city's budget for 2023-24 allocates $14 million for creating an Office of Unarmed Response. That same budget also allocates about $3.2 billion for the LAPD.

"It's not just a question of who is responding, but what they are responding to and that's part of what we're putting together here in this report," Blumenfield said.

The Office of Unarmed Response will house the city's existing alternative response programs, including the Call Redirection to Ensure Suicide Safety; the Crisis and Incident Response through Community-Led Engagement; Gang Reduction and Youth Development; Summer Night Lights; and the Domestic Abuse Response Team.

"It's important to realize we are already doing a lot of alternative interventions more than most cities anywhere, and we are such a large city that it kind of gets lost in all the different pieces," Blumenfield said. "So, putting it all together under one roof and moving us forward to the point where we're going to be diverting 911 calls is really important.

"This is a historic moment, even though we're just getting to that next step."