Anchorage police launch phased pre-arrest deflection pilot Sept. 23

Anchorage police will launch a phased pre-arrest deflection pilot Sept. 23, beginning with the department's Mobile Intervention Teams before expanding to patrol officers.

The program gives officers a formal way to refer eligible people whose police contact is tied to substance use or mental illness toward community care instead of arrest or prosecution. A municipal contract memorandum says deflection is intended for situations in which public safety is not at risk and, when applicable, the victim consents.

Police will not provide treatment at the point of contact. True North Recovery is contracted to receive officer referrals and provide a warm handoff, treatment navigation, individual case management and participation monitoring. Treatment itself comes from community providers.

Steve Williams, APD's director of diversion programming, told the Assembly's Housing and Homelessness Committee on Wednesday that the pilot will expand in phases. The department is building on police contact rather than stepping back from it, he said, using what he called "the leverage of the criminal justice system."

The Assembly approved the first-year $397,900 contract with True North by an 11-0 vote. The work is funded with opioid-settlement money. Three optional annual renewals could bring the four-year value to about $1.66 million.

The committee also discussed separate data from Anchorage's camping ordinance. Between August 2025 and June 2026, officers documented 1,085 contacts. Of those, 962 ended in voluntary compliance, 72 included an accepted service referral and 123 ended in arrest. Those contacts occurred before the deflection pilot and do not measure its performance. The APD dashboard says the ordinance is designed around warnings, education and voluntary compliance rather than arrest alone.

Public commenter Jamie Lopez cited a more recent month in which four of 155 people who complied accepted services, though Lopez did not identify the source of those figures. Lopez argued that linking services to police discourages participation. The pilot beginning Sept. 23 will test whether a dedicated non-police navigator changes that result.