Mobile Crisis Response Teams Support Better Policing: Evidence from CAHOOTS
This paper provides the first evaluation of CAHOOTS in Eugene, Oregon, the longest-running U.S. civilian mobile crisis response team (CRT) program, which sends a non-uniformed mental health worker and medic to 911 calls. We find that program expansions into new areas and hours reduced arrests by 24 percentage points, likely reflecting CRTs’ role in de-escalating tense situations. To assess the gains from further expansion, we exploit idiosyncratic variation in CRT availability to estimate the effect of marginal CRT responses. Most marginal responses do not affect arrests and would otherwise go unanswered, suggesting the program already covers the most urgent calls.
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Copy CitationJonathan Davis, Samuel Norris, Jadon Schmitt, Yotam Shem-Tov, and Chelsea Strickland, "Mobile Crisis Response Teams Support Better Policing: Evidence from CAHOOTS," NBER Working Paper 33761 (2025), https://doi.org/10.3386/w33761.Download Citation
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