Pitkin County PACT Program Relieves Police of Mental Health Calls

What does it actually cost to keep the lights on for the people who are struggling when the rest of Aspen is asleep?

It’s a question that hangs in the crisp mountain air, heavier than the cold itself, if you listen for it. For years, the default response to a behavioral health crisis in Pitkin County has been a siren, a cruiser, and a cell. But this year, the county is showing its work, releasing an annual report on the Pitkin Area Co-Responder Teams, or PACT, that suggests a quiet revolution is happening in the valley’s mental health infrastructure. The numbers are specific, tangible, and undeniably local: in 2025, PACT served 249 individuals through 1,294 visits.

Raleigh Bacharach-Hope, the PACT administrator for Pitkin County Public Health, doesn’t just hand you a spreadsheet. She walks you through the texture of the work. It’s about reducing the unnecessary reliance on jails and emergency departments, yes, but it’s also about the relief it offers to the police officers who are often left holding the bag for situations they weren’t trained to solve.

“(Law enforcement officials) do a wonderful job at being trauma-informed, meeting our community where they’re at, but we also want to recognize that they are not trained as social workers,” Bacharach-Hope said. “So another part of our program goal is to alleviate our law enforcement partners from jobs that they are not trained necessarily to do.”

That’s the hook for the rest of us. When a cop is stuck at a crisis scene for an hour because they’re waiting for a mental health professional, that’s an hour of reduced patrol coverage, an hour of delayed response times for the rest of the community. PACT responded to 52 calls where a mental health professional relieved the first responders already on-scene. That’s 52 times a cruiser could pull away, a beat could be covered, a different emergency could be answered. It’s a subtle shift, but in a county where every minute counts, it adds up.

The program, funded by the state’s Behavioral Health Administration, is one of the first of its kind in a rural Colorado community. It’s not just about the crisis moment. While other networks, like the Hope Center for Basalt, are often oriented toward the immediate emergency, PACT offers continued support. Over 1,000 follow-up check-ins were conducted in 2025 alone. These aren’t just box-checking exercises; they’re connections to support networks, meetings with clinicians, and check-ins with peer-supporters who have lived experience of behavioral health challenges.

“We were one of the first rural communities in Colorado to have a co-responder program,” Bacharach-Hope said. “Co-responder models are becoming more popular as years go on.”

The term “behavioral health” here is a big umbrella, covering mental health, substance use, and unhoused domestic violence. It’s a recognition that the line between these issues is often blurred, and the response needs to be flexible. The program serves residents from Aspen to Redstone, a geographic spread that requires more than just a single office in downtown Aspen. It requires a network that can reach out, touch base, and hold space for people who might otherwise fall through the cracks.

If you look closely at the report, you see that the system is working as intended. It’s not perfect. It’s not a cure-all. But it’s a different way of seeing the same problems. It’s about treating the person, not just the incident. And in a place where we often feel isolated in our struggles, that kind of continuous support might be the most valuable resource of all.

The sun dips behind the mountains, casting long shadows over the Roaring Fork River. The water keeps moving, indifferent to the chaos on the banks, but the people watching it are beginning to notice the changes.