Exactly, the people who will be committed against their will would still be committed against their will if police respond. I know this for a fact because the one guy I know who encountered police during a mental health episode ended up commitment.

The difference here is taking away the addition of police to the incidents. No handcuffs or jail holdings, no being roughed up or killed.

Hopefully the mental health person knows how to de-escalate the situation - I think this is huge. I think the friend I mentioned above could have avoided impatient treatment if he had a qualified mental health person respond instead of the police, due to the situation around his incident/arrest.

This just isn't a good faith argument.

This is the exact problem with that argument. Healthcare workers can commit you against your will just as police officers can as well.

Right. So the improvement is that health care workers who are actually qualified to make that determination show up and don’t escalate the situation with violence or legal trouble. That’s a whole lot of improvement. And sounds like very little downside since the risk associated is identical otherwise.