Jody Meiman of Louisville Metro Emergency Services Wins the Community Behavioral Health Award for Intentionality
On September 14th, Seven Counties Services hosted its Annual Dinner. It’s a time to gather and recognize our leadership, board of directors, donors, volunteers, outstanding employees, and award community partners with four Community Behavior Health Awards displaying our values of Compassion, Intentionality, Resilience, and Equity.
With great pleasure, we’re proud to announce the 2023 Intentionality Award was presented to Jody Meiman, the Executive Director for Louisville Metro Emergency Services.
The Community Behavioral Health Award for Intentionality recognizes individuals or organizations who have demonstrated exceptional commitment and dedication to promoting mental, physical, and spiritual well-being through intentional and purposeful actions. Being the recipient of this award, Jody has shown a profound understanding of the importance of mental health and has implemented specific initiatives, programs, or practices that have had a positive impact on the lives of others in the behavioral health community.
As the Executive Director for Louisville Metro Emergency Services, Jody oversees the Crisis Call Diversion Program, also known as the Deflection Program, which operates in partnership with Seven Counties Services. This program diverts non-emergent 911 mental health-related calls away from the Louisville Metro Police Department and to people trained in mental health crisis prevention. Since its launch, the Deflection Program has resulted in more than 1,400 Crisis Triage Worker encounters, with the average encounter lasting about 15 minutes. The Crisis Triage Workers have made more than 500 mobile runs to help more than 330 unique individuals. As of July 1, the hiring of additional staff made it possible to extend service hours from 10 AM to 10 PM, seven days a week.
Because Jody was unable to attend the Annual Dinner, his colleague James Polk, the Deflection Program Project Manager, accepted the award on his behalf. In his acceptance speech, James shared about his background in EMS before retiring in 2019. He has since returned to help with the Deflection Program.
“One of the things I saw in my 20-plus years of being out there was the cycle a lot of the clients we see today were in,” said James. “It’s great to have been brought back by Director Meiman and be able to work with this group of people who are doing great things in the community. It’s awesome to see that we’re breaking that cycle and people are getting the help they truly need to be able to live productive lives. Thank you.”
Want to learn more about the Deflection Program and how you can expand mental health services to the community? Consider a career with Seven Counties Services! View openings for the MetroSafe Deflection team today. Together we ensure a better community for all!
