Apply to Join the Mobile Crisis Intervention Unit’s Community Advisory Board
To promote community oversight and ongoing collaboration with program leaders, the New Orleans Health Department (NOHD) is launching a Community Advisory Board (CAB) for the MCIU. Broadly, CAB members will be tasked with sharing feedback on MCIU policies and performance with NOHD and RHD staff, as well as other relevant agency representatives, to ensure that program activities reflect the insights of directly impacted community members and ultimately meet community needs.
CAB meetings will focus on a range of topics, including:
- programmatic updates;
- community education;
- coordination with other community resources; and
- strategies for ensuring transparency and data-driven implementation.
If you have experience as a behavioral healthcare consumer, as a family member or caregiver for someone with behavioral health needs, and/or as a behavioral health service provider, please consider applying to join the CAB. Applicants must reside in Orleans Parish and be knowledgeable about the needs of people living with mental illness and/or substance use disorders. Applicants should also consider their availability to participate in quarterly meetings, as well as a few monthly meetings when the group first launches, over the course of MCIU’s first full year of operation. All community members selected by NOHD staff to serve on the CAB as private citizens – and not as representatives for public health or safety agencies – will be provided with a stipend for their participation in meetings.
Please note that in selecting community members for the CAB, NOHD staff will prioritize the inclusion of Black, Indigenous, and other people of color; members of local immigrant communities; LGBTQ people; people with disabilities; and people who have experienced or are experiencing houselessness. NOHD staff also aim to convene a group that represents a geographically broad cross-section of the community. Additionally, representatives of various stakeholder agencies (e.g., the New Orleans Police Department and Orleans Parish Communications District) will be directly invited by NOHD staff to participate in CAB meetings as non-voting members for their insight into MCIU operations, including MCIU collaboration with 911 call-takers and other first responders.
CAB application: https://app.smartsheet.com/b/form/7dcaa876180441bb9801dfca47fd1ec0
