LGBTQ Clevelanders Report Poor Interactions With First Responders, New Study Finds

Less than half of Clevelanders’ interactions with first responders are positive experiences, a report released last month by Policy Matters Ohio found. And the widest disparity in responses came not between white and Black residents, but between those who identify as LGBTQ+ and those who do not.

That study, a follow-up to a similar policy investigation on homeless Clevelanders last October, was a collaborative push for the state-focused think tank to help better guide law enforcement and EMTs into wholly appropriate care models. Or, as the report’s entitled: “Talk to me like a regular person, not a criminal.”

“You’re looking at these vulnerable communities, and they’re telling you, just treat me like I’m a person. Listen. Be kind,” Piet van Lier, a senior researcher for Policy Matters Ohio who worked on the study, told Scene.

“It’s, ‘Think about how you can help me and make sure you’re trained to be able to do these things, to be able to listen, that you know about trauma-informed care. That’s what people need to know.”

Garnered from a survey of 580 Cuyahoga County residents, primarily those in the Black and LGBTQ communities, a team of three at Policy Matters—Bree Easterling, van Lier and Cori Schleiffer (who works for REACH)—found that only about 36 percent “felt safe around police.” Twenty-two percent felt cops exacerbated safety all around.

“Overall, white and Black survey participants answered this question similarly,” the report reads, regarding safety. “Our analysis found more variation between participants who identified as LGBTQ+ and those who did not.”

Policy Matters’ investigation into a local’s view of first responders comes at a time when city governments and advocates are pressuring police departments to revise response policies to better fit modes of crisis—those dealing with mental health or drug abuse issues, or crises of identity.

In May, several suburbs on the east side of Cleveland expressed interest in sharpening their crisis responses, a push imitating Shaker Heights’ hiring of mental health coordinators in 2022. Cleveland itself has yet to see a proper co-response model developed, despite Mayor Justin Bibb’s persistent desire to see one installed.

That revamped program on the East Side, Axios Cleveland reported, aims to funnel roughly $1.2 million in county, state and federal dollars to Richmond Heights, South Euclid, Cleveland Heights and University Heights, in an effort to pair first responders with mental health professionals.

It’s a similar desire shared by Bibb, who has long wanted to add a mental health response option to 911 calls, along with direct situations better suited to social workers—welfare checks, incidents involving the unhoused. Cleveland has endeavored to expand on a pilot “co-responder” model, in which uniformed officers accompany those trained to deal with non-violent calls.

The county’s Alcohol, Drug Addiction and Mental Health Services Board has suggested, Signal Cleveland reported, such a care response model could be tested out this summer.

Which should, according to Policy Matters, appease those skeptical of old ways of crisis response, which lean heavily on calls to police. Especially when, as the report found, a vast majority of first response calls are due to mental health issues (32 percent) and drug use (25 percent).

“Police should be involved in actual emergencies,” one survey respondent wrote. “A lot of them aren’t trained for mental health issues.”

“I feel [police] training is very inadequate,” another said, “and just seeing police can [exacerbate] a situation unnecessarily.”

Easterling, specifically targeted marginalized populations—queer, Black and homeless people—to help bring up what they and their colleagues feel is the primary shortfall with first responders. (Forty percent of those surveyed identified as LGBTQ.) Generally, repsondents reported favorable interactions with EMTs and social workers compared to police.

In an interview, Easterling, who is Black and trans/nonbinary, painted issues of misgendering and harassment as dire to address as the quality of the emergency response itself.

“Having gender-inclusive language matters, you know, even beyond the crisis itself,” they told Scene. “Because part of the goal with care response is you meet that person where they are when they’re in crisis.”

Easterling, Schleiffer and van Lier recommended Cleveland’s policy makers bolster training with the underrepresented, especially its LGBTQ population.

It also urged City Hall to somehow weave 911 and 988, a hotline used for suicide, to better funnel calls to the most appropriate sources. Diverting calls to 988, Easterling added, would help cut down on the less-than-preferred interactions those surveyed had with cops in general.

“One in five of every individual has had a negative experience with first responders in a time of crisis,” they said. “That means if five of us are sitting in a room, one of us has had a bad experience.

“That is significant,” they said.

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