a mental illness or an intellectual or developmental disability are often charged with minor, nonviolent offenses. For many of these persons, arrest and incarceration could have been avoided if they had access to intensive community-based services and stable housing. (5) Many of the police encounters that lead to the incarceration (and in too many cases, death) of people with mental illness or an intellectual or developmental disability could be avoided by having in place systems that ensure that calls to 911 or to law enforcement result in dispatch of mental health professionals, peer support workers, or others rather than law enforcement officers. (6) Many people who are incarcerated would be better served in community services. If there were sufficient community services, and persons with mental illness or an intellectual or developmental disability were connected to those services rather than being arrested, thousands of people with mental illness or an intellectual or developmental disability would avoid needless admissions to hospitals or jails. Further, jails and hospitals would experience less crowding. 3. Grants for mental health professionals to act as first responders (a) In general The Secretary of Health and Human Services (in this section referred to as the Secretary ), acting through the Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Use and in consultation with the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice (in this section referred to as the Assistant Attorney General ), shall award grants to States and political subdivisions of States— (1) to hire, employ, train, and dispatch mental health professionals to respond in lieu of law enforcement officers in emergencies in which— (A) an individual calling 911 or another emergency hotline states that a person— (i) is in a mental health crisis