City Approves Suicide Prevention Policy

Friends and family of the five Palo Alto teens who killed themselves last school year on the city's Caltrain tracks might not ever know what was surging through their minds when they took their lives.

But experts are confident that most of them made the decision and followed through with it inside of 60 minutes. Specifically, studies find that 70 percent of people between 13 and 34 years old may decide and act on suicide within an hour, according to a Palo Alto staff report. 

The Palo Alto City Council passed a new suicide prevention policy Monday night that adopts practices and strategies used by the Suicide Prevention Resource Center and also works with a policy passed by the Santa Clara Board of Supervisors in August.

Liz Kniss, former Palo Alto mayor and current county supervisor, told the council that suicide prevention is one of the most important topics the county board has dealt with.

"It's one of those issues that we don't want to talk about in polite society," Kniss said.

In response to the five suicides, the city has worked closely with Project Safety Net, a group of parents, teens and school district officials, to treat the possibility of suicide in young people before it has a chance to morph into a plan. That includes posting security guards at Caltrain crossings to intervene in future suicides. TrackWatch, a group of community volunteers, also monitors crossings during Caltrain operating hours.

Funding for both the security firm and TrackWatch has come primarily through community donations, which have totaled roughly $75,000 so far and covered the entire bill for the 2009-10 school year. According to TrackWatch, private patrols cost $3,000 per week. 

The effort will go through the current school year as well thanks to $33,000 in recent city funding, City Manager James Keene said. 

At the county level, a 36-member suicide prevention advisory committee made up of law enforcement, politicians, doctors and others, has met twice a month since December 2009.

Another former mayor, Victor Ojakian, told the council that adopting policies and creating awareness is one of the best tactics against suicide. Ojackian and Kniss co-chair the suicide prevention advisory committee.

"There is no fool-proof policy for preventing something like suicide," Ojackian said. "From learning nationally, (policy) is one of those things that is important to do."

Click here to find out more about Project Safety Net's TrackWatch effort.