Surge in violence, understaffing has mental health toll on police officers

The Lexington Police Department places a priority on officer physical and mental well-being

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WTVQ) – Another homicide Thursday afternoon in Lexington marks the 36th of the year for the city, just one behind last year’s total which was the most ever in its history. This taking a toll on officers’ mental health.

“Officers are seeing more and more traumatic things at a greater pace than obviously in years past,” says Lieutenant Randall Combs, coordinator for the ‘peer support team’ in the Lexington Police Department.

Combs says the support team has certified “peer support officers” who hold round table discussions for officers who respond to traumatic calls.

“It’s just an effort to get officers together to talk about what happened that day, what happened from their perspective, how they’ve been impacted by it, how their family’s been impacted by it,” says Combs.

According to Combs, other wellness programs include group workouts, yoga and Jiu-Jitsu, a wellness fair with vendors for physical and mental wellness, a weekly meal prep recipe and a list of therapists officers can reach out to.

“The department has changed drastically with the focus on wellness, the focus on caring about officers outside of work and making sure that officers make it to retirement not only physically healthy, but mentally and emotionally healthy as well.”

The Lexington Police Department says it’s worked hard to combat the stigma that comes along with officers asking for professional help. The department has set up many wellness programs to take care of its officers’ physical and mental health, normalizing it within the department to seek help.

“In this profession, you need to reach out and talk to someone,” says Combs. “So, we have officers and leaders stand up and say like ‘hey I do this, it’s helped me and there’s no shame in that and we want to encourage you to do the same things’.”

Lieutenant Combs says overall, though there are some feelings of frustration and burnout, the city’s officers are still passionate for what they do.

“If they weren’t passionate about what they do, they wouldn’t get so frustrated about the things that we’re seeing with violence,” says Combs. “The department cares about them and they’re willing to make sacrifices in those cases because they know that what they do is important and they’ve got people that stand behind them.”

As for how the community can support the city’s police?

“Be loud and outspoken about their support for the police,” says Combs. “We know there’s a silent majority but it’s nice when that majority is not so silent.”