Norman City Council discussed possible solutions to address mental health after the death of a local business owner and the upcoming disbandment of a homeless encampment during a Tuesday meeting.
Several council members requested to vote on forming a mobile crisis response unit to respond to mental health-related calls due to the recent death of Shannon Hanchett, owner of Okie Baking Co.’s Cookie Cottage on Main Street.
Hanchett was found unconscious and not breathing in her cell in the Cleveland County Detention Center 12 days after being arrested by the Norman Police Department on misdemeanor charges for calling 911 with a false alarm and obstructing an officer.
“I am truly heartbroken to learn her death was due to another failure in our legal system,” Ward 1 Councilmember Brandi Studley said.
The police report for Hanchett’s arrest said her behavior was “consistent with some type of mental health disorder.” Hanchett initially called for a welfare check on her children and was arrested after saying she would call 911 again multiple times.
Studley requested to schedule a vote on forming and funding a mobile crisis response unit at the Jan. 10, 2023, meeting.
Cleveland County currently has two mobile crisis units operated by the Central Oklahoma Community Mental Health Center, according to The Norman Transcript. One crisis unit responds to children, their parents and adults through age 24, while the second unit responds to all other adults age 25 and older.
“This has been a fundamental breakdown of the policies that we have in place to protect our community members,” Ward 2 Councilmember Lauren Schueler said. “How do we look at those protocols to make sure that we’re saving lives, that we’re putting people on a path to healing, and not just incriminating them and placing them in custody when that might not be the best course of action?”
Schueler, Ward 7 Councilmember Stephen Holman and Ward 8 Councilmember Matthew Peacock voiced their support for a mobile crisis response unit.
“We all have to do better,” Peacock said. “We can’t ever let this happen in our community again. To ensure that it doesn’t, we have to challenge the status quo and come up with a new approach that doesn’t endanger people when they are in crisis and calling for help.”
Schueler said she wants to focus on the outcome of the tragedy and how to move forward.
“We don’t need to see anyone else suffer from a lack of Norman-based mental health crisis response,” Ward 4 Councilmember Helen Grant said.
Council members also discussed a homeless encampment that will be evacuated next week.
The encampment, located at Interstate-35 by the Canadian River, will be evacuated due to a recent fire that damaged the structure and will require repairs, Tiffany Vrska, the City of Norman's chief communications officer, wrote in an email to OU Daily.
Vrska said the Continuum of Care, Care-A-Vans and Social Injustice League of Norman were contacted last week to relocate as many people as possible.
“This is simply not true,” Studley said. “I am the founder of Social Injustice League. I had not been contacted and neither had Care-A-Vans.”
Studley said registered sex offenders aren’t able to go to Norman’s warming shelter and must now find an alternative without the encampment on I-35 and the Canadian River.
“Where will they go once they’re forced out of the river?” Studley said. “Does not knowing where registered sex offenders and violent offenders are make us a safer community?”
Studley said it is unacceptable for Norman to continue disbanding encampments without answers to those questions and resolutions in place.
In December 2021, an encampment south of the McClain Bank and the Turtle Creek Mobile Home Park was cleared after owners of the property requested that NPD evict its residents. In July, Norman police forced residents out of an encampment on private property north of Crest Foods.
The situation on I-35 and the Canadian River is being handled through the Oklahoma Department of Transportation, Vrska wrote.
“Our role as the Department of Transportation is to ensure the safety of the traveling public by making any necessary repairs to the bridge,” Lisa Shearer-Salim, ODOT public information manager, told OU Daily.
Shearer-Salim said ODOT won’t have access underneath the bridge until after the encampment is cleared. ODOT can’t physically remove people from the encampment, and has asked Norman for assistance in clearing the area and are working together closely, she said.
During the meeting, Care-A-Vans received this year’s Humans Rights Award.
Studley said she found it hypocritical of Norman to accept Care-A-Vans' services without offering reimbursement for gas.
“(Care-A-Vans does) provide an essential service that is not duplicated currently in Norman by providing transportation to individuals that need it,” Holman said.
This article was updated on Dec. 14 at 4:58 p.m. to include information from Shearer-Salim regarding ODOT's role in evacuating the encampment on I-35 and the Canadian River.
