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Hope First Roc, an emerging model in community-focused, non-police crisis response, will launch in the fall, marking a key development in recommendations made following the death of Daniel Prude in 2020.
The program aims to mobilize trained peer responders to address mental health and related nonviolent crises throughout the city of Rochester, but for now, it will be limited to the 14611 and 14619 ZIP codes. The program is inspired by community responder models in other states. Hope First Roc seeks to address a common criticism of policing by abolitionist advocates: that traditional police responses aren’t adequately equipped to handle nonviolent mental health crises.
“People aren’t equipped to deal with any crisis situation. They have no training. They have no knowledge about what to do,” says Rafael Outland, a member of the Rochester Community Advisory Board of the Daniel’s Law Coalition. “People aren’t incarcerated following our kind of intervention (and) no one is murdered.”
The pilot builds off the first of two key recommendations made in a December 2024 Daniel’s Law Task Force report, that communities establish a defined behavioral health team to serve as an alternative to traditional police responses. The report recommends that law enforcement be deployed only in response to the threat of violence. The second recommendation is to implement a statewide technical assistance center to support local initiatives.
Under Hope First Roc, responders trained in trauma-informed, culturally competent practices would be the first to address a nonviolent crisis, offering support and resources should those in need choose these services. The program differs from the city’s Person-in-Crisis team in forming a response that is not reliant on the police.
The Hope First Roc members serve as emergency response social workers for the entire Rochester area. PIC teams have received over 35,000 calls throughout the city since first being established in 2020; a majority of them were responses to emotional health calls.
Practices and responses in the new model are designed with autonomy in mind, with responders trained on de-escalation and empathy. The program will also emphasize recruiting those with direct experiences and ties to the locations they respond to, focusing on aligning service providers with the intricacies of the communities they serve.
“(Service providers) are no longer (just) those who have all the credentials and all the (education), but more about (those) who have deep-held connections in the community,” notes Outland. “We’re really thinking about what kind of grounding they already have within the community, and how that’s going to be of benefit.”
The desire for an alternative response to nonviolent situations has been at the forefront of crisis stabilization initiatives and the Daniel’s Law Coalition ever since Prude died after becoming unresponsive in an encounter with Rochester Police Department officers in March 2020. Prude had experienced a mental health crisis.
Just two days after the announcement of the program, on July 31, two Rochester police officers were involved in the shooting of 38-year-old Akintunde Campbell, who neighbors said had a history of mental illness. A neighbor reported him being nonverbal, which is consistent with statements made during an RPD press briefing on Aug. 1. Chief David Smith said he is unable to attest to Campbell’s mental state but described him as “very nonverbal.”
The entire interaction only lasted a couple of minutes, escalating rapidly in the same community where Hope First Roc plans to begin its service.
For Councilmember Stanley Martin, who was present at the scene that night, having an alternative response would have allowed providers to be more engaged with the community—without ever resorting to violence.
“We’re very interested in preventing mental health crises before they even happen,” says Martin. “To do that, we’ll actually be taking the time getting to know folks in the area we’re serving, building those relationships, having connections prior to when the crisis happened. So, building that trust and working to create safety plans so they have alternatives and know that they can call someone else before 911 is even called.”
For Martin and other members of the Community Advisory Board, trust is at the forefront of Hope First Roc—understanding that implementation of the program comes hand-in-hand with fostering trust among the community.
“We want to trust our communities. We want to trust our neighbors to know what’s going on with each other and to respond appropriately,” says Daniel’s Law Community Advisory Board member Mallory Szymanski. “I think by approaching our community, not as a problem to be solved, but as a group of folks deserving of care, compassion, and love and trust, that that’s a door opened.”
Narm Nathan is a Rochester Beacon contributing writer and a member of the Oasis Project’s inaugural cohort. Emmely Eli Texcucano is a member of the Oasis Project’s second cohort.
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