In the early 2010's, Tucson experienced exponential increases in opioid-related emergency department visits and overdose deaths. The Tucson Police Department, which has had a long history in crisis intervention, responded with a multi-pronged approach to address the opioid crisis including: 

• Substance Use Resource Team - begun in 2018, officers and peer support specialists deflect people with opioid use disorder from jail to treatment, but people may also be able to self-refer or be recruited through active outreach with peer navigators. Officers have completed more than one-thousand deflections. 
• Strong collaboration with providers of medications for opioid use disorder to link individuals to effective treatment
• Mental Health Support Team - established in 2014, this is a co-responder program with officers and mental health clinicians to proactively and compassionately connect people who have mental health and substance use treatment needs to services before, during, and after a crisis
• Crisis Response Center - provides 24/7 access to emergency psychiatric and substance addiction treatment services for both adults and youth and has a secure entrance for law enforcement to bring people to treatment rather than to jail
• One of the first police departments in Arizona to train and equip law enforcement with naloxone
• Officer training on the neurobiology of addiction, the science on medications for opioid use disorder, and the impact of adverse childhood experiences

Detail and contact information can be found in the presentations here and here. An overview of the multi-pronged program can be found in the news articles here and here and the video here. The program has been highlighted in the report on police-mental health collaborations here.