The Baltimore City Council has approved the creation of the Department of Neighborhood Safety, a new public agency to handle nonviolent 911 calls, mental health crises, and other community safety needs.
With C4 and Bryan Nehman on Thursday, Mayor Brandon Scott says it’s still early in the process to identify who will lead the department and detail how exactly it will work.
“We’ll have a bill signing in the next couple of weeks for it, and we’ll get moving now,” he said. “We can actually get moving on a search.”
READ: Baltimore City Council approves creation of new Department of Neighborhood Safety
DNS will be a third branch of public safety in Baltimore.
Councilman Mark Conway was the lone councilmember who voted no on the agency, citing funding issues. Scott addressed those concerns.
“As when you’re building an agency from the ground up, you start with the base, and we know the base,” he said. “Obviously, you talked about the base with the opioid funds, and then we grow from there like you would do anything else. It also depends on demand and what we’re able to get as far as staffing and what we’re able to do.”
