NAMI, Grassroots Advocates Call on FCC to Improve 988 Routing to Support Local Response

Jul 11, 2024

NAMI and NAMI advocates last month called on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to ensure that calls to the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline are routed to local call centers while protecting callers’ personal information. NAMI advocates provided more than half of all comments received during the comment period, urging quick action to connect people to lifesaving care.

Throughout the FCC’s first public comment period on a proposal to route calls to the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, NAMI activated its grassroots advocates across the country to share their experiences directly with the FCC. Of the approximately 2,800 comments received by the FCC, more than half were submitted by NAMI advocates, stressing the benefits of georouting calls to 988, or the process of connecting callers to a call center based on their general location information, while protecting confidentiality. NAMI hopes that the FCC will listen to the overwhelming response of advocates and finalize the proposal as soon as possible.

NAMI has been urging action on this issue since December 2020 — two months after the law designating 988 was signed. NAMI also submitted comments directly to FCC and led joint comments with 30 partners of the #ReimagineCrisis campaign urging action.

“Every person who experiences a mental health crisis deserves to receive an immediate mental health response. Tragically, few know that pressing need more than NAMI advocates, who are powered by their lived experience to change the crisis response system in their communities,” said NAMI Chief Advocacy Officer Hannah Wesolowski. “We know the best response is a local one — one that offers people in crisis or distress with resources in their local community.”

Currently, contacts to the 988 Lifeline are routed based on the help seeker’s area code. Because cell phone calls to the 988 Lifeline may not match the area code where a person lives or where they travel to, some people will be routed to a call center that is not close to their physical location. Implementing a georouting solution that connects calls based on general geographic location would improve 988 services while protecting confidentially and avoiding disclosure of a caller’s precise location.

NAMI has been a leading voice urging the federal government to take action this year. Earlier this year, NAMI led a group of over 40 national organizations calling on the FCC and HHS to take immediate action to start this process. Learn more about NAMI’s efforts around georouting contacts to the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.

If you missed the opportunity to write the FCC about this important issue, share your story with NAMI so we can continue to advocate for crisis response services.