Community Alternative Response Emergency Services (CARES)- MN

The Saint Paul Fire Department’s Community Alternative Response Emergency Services (CARES) Team is a mobile crisis response unit. The team pairs a Fire EMT with a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, and responds to calls involving mental health crisis, behavioral emergencies and non-emergency medical needs. Eventually, we’ll move them to a co-responder model.

To reduce the potential for harm to Saint Paul residents and provide the best possible care for all our neighbors, the City is investing in special new units of trained professionals to handle urgent problems that don’t involve weapons or violence — our community-first response teams, coordinated by the Office of Neighborhood Safety. These teams coordinate their work every day, and their leaders meet every week to improve the service they provide.