A Model to Assess the Feasibility of 911 Call Diversion Programs

Abstract

Reforms to deploy civilian responders to non-criminal emergency calls may reduce demands on police departments and negative interactions between police and civilians, but there is presently little empirical evidence on the feasibility of these proposals. We develop a model of emergency call risk to evaluate which calls could be transitioned to civilians based on a rich dataset of community-initiated police emergency calls, their disposition, and the time use of Baltimore Police Department officers. Nearly half of 911 calls could be assigned to civilians contingent on community risk tolerance, as expressed by the probability that the call results in a Part I crime. We use Monte Carlo methods to estimate the financial and time use implications of transferring low risk calls to civilians. The simulation shows re-tasking frees police officer time equivalent to 98 additional full-time officers, about 12 percent of the Department’s current patrol personnel.