Laguna Beach launches Be Well OC mobile mental health and wellness services

Laguna Beach marked the beginning of its partnership with Be Well Orange County on Tuesday with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on the cobblestones of Main Beach Park.

The event signaled the start of a two-year agreement for mobile mental health and wellness services in the community. A big, blue Be Well OC van served as the backdrop for the ceremony and members of the local mobile response team were on hand to share information about the operations.

In April, the Laguna Beach City Council unanimously approved the pilot program for the crisis intervention service. In taking that action, the panel directed city staff to return with a report following the first year of operations. The council also called on staff to look into long-term funding options.

City staff noted in that meeting the program has been fully funded for the first two years. The services will be available 12 hours a day, seven days a week.

The Be Well OC van at a ribbon-cutting ceremony at Main Beach in Laguna Beach on Tuesday.

(Don Leach / Staff Photographer)

“We first launched in October of 2021, and it was part of a movement to enhance the continuum of care for mental health,� Kathryn Hamel, vice president of mobile operations for Be Well OC, said following the ceremony. “Those that are suffering from mental health crisis and addiction issues in [the] community, we are here to support them, to stabilize them, and to refer them into services that help support them move through their crisis, move through their addiction.�

The Be Well OC launch coincided with Laguna Beach’s National Night Out, an annual event that fosters collaboration between public safety personnel and their local communities. Advocates of the program have touted its ability to lighten the load on law enforcement and emergency medical service personnel. Hamel said calls for service would still be fielded by a public safety dispatch team.

“We alleviate first-responder hours from responding to calls for service involving mental health and addiction,� Hamel said. “We are the person who shoulders those calls because we have the time, we have the resources, we have the ability to focus on that issue when public safety [personnel] are responding to multiple calls for service, because the community needs them and they need them right now. For us, we’re able to focus and deescalate and to stabilize in the community, and that’s the benefit of us working alongside of public safety.�

Assemblywoman Cottie Petrie-Norris helped secure $1.5 million in state funding for the Be Well OC program in Laguna Beach.

“It’s no secret that this is a universal struggle, and it’s also no secret that our system for mental and behavioral healthcare is fundamentally broken,� Petrie-Norris said. “We see the fallout from that each and every day in our hospitals, in our county jail and on our city streets. What we’re doing right now is just not working. We need to radically reimagine mental and behavioral healthcare here in Orange County and all across the state of California.

“That’s why this has been a top priority for me since I was first elected in 2018, and I’ve been a strong supporter for Be Well, who is building out an integrative and innovative system of behavioral and mental healthcare all across the county.�

Laguna Beach received $405,111 in CARES Act funding from the county, as well as a $200,000 contribution from the Ueberroth Family Foundation in support of the program.

Be Well OC has mobile response teams operating in seven cities across Orange County. Laguna Beach has now joined Anaheim, Garden Grove, Huntington Beach, Irvine, Newport Beach and Westminster in partnering with the agency.

“I think one of the things that I’ve really recognized is the at-home support,� Orange County Supervisor Katrina Foley said with respect to the benefits of the program. “People can call from their home, and they’re in a crisis, a family member’s in a crisis, and they can have somebody come out. You don’t have to wait to get a doctor’s appointment, you don’t have to go to the emergency room. You can have a professional person come out to your home. … That, to me, is one of the features of the Be Well program that I really admire most because people have not, until this time, had access to mental health treatment on demand at their homes.�