On the recordMay 16, 2024
I thank my colleague from Vermont for hosting this Special Order hour on mental health. Mr. Speaker, so long before I came to Congress when I served on the board of the Los Angeles Community College, we would hold monthly board meetings throughout the district, and it is the largest community college district in the country. We had nine campuses, and so we would visit them regularly. These meetings were oftentimes very long, they were open to the public, and lots of people would come. Lots of people, lots of characters, and lots of mental wellness issues were often on display. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department was contracted with the district, and it was the sheriff's department that would provide security for these meetings. I would watch these officers, mostly men, but I would keep my eye on them to see how they were doing. I would watch them take into account the changing surroundings based on the meeting and the topics and adapt to the circumstances of the evening. On occasion, these men, these good men, would have to manage a mental health episode by an attendee of the meetings, a mental health episode that verged on the unsafe. I have to tell you; these sheriffs were not trained for that. They did not apply to become a sheriff to do that kind of work. In reality, they should not have been doing that. Yet, we dump more and more social, economic, mental, and physical healthcare issues on their plate.…
