Meet the Winner of Our 2026 Outstanding Team Performance Award
The Outstanding Team Performance Award is open to any team that has gone above and beyond in their duties and worked collaboratively with each other and/or other departments, demonstrating commitment to innovation and/or success of the organization. This may include situations where teams may have effectively managed and excelled during situations with unforeseen circumstances, emergencies or high-stress situations. This year, 22 teams were nominated for this award. To see a full list and who the finalists were for this award, click here.
For the members of Behavioral Health’s Mobile Crisis Float Team, every day presents unique challenges. Launched in July 2025 under a contract with New York City’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, the team’s job is to step in, often on short notice, when another mobile crisis team in the city is unavailable.
Six days a week, this team reports to work without knowing which neighborhood, or even which borough, they’ll be working in that day. They deliver care wherever their clients might be living—whether that’s an apartment, a shelter, or a subway station.
This mandate is why the team was out on the windswept streets of Manhattan one bone-chilling, frigid night this past January, helping an unhoused New Yorker move to a warming center. Importantly, this included moving all of the individual’s belongings to the warming center as well.
“When you’re living on the street, in an encampment, or on a subway platform, everything you own is with you, and you don’t want to leave your world behind,” explains Deirdre DeLeo, Director of Behavioral Health Programs, who, along with Debra Thomas, Associate Director, Behavioral Health, oversees the Mobile Crisis Float Team. “To know you can take all of your belongings with you is a huge gift.”
That kind of insight, along with plenty of agility, compassion and creativity, beautifully captures the essence of the Float team. It also illustrates why the team has been selected to receive VNS Health’s prestigious Outstanding Team Performance Award.
The team members on the Behavioral Health Mobile Crisis Float Team include:
- Patrick O’Connor, Program Manager
- Adeline Mannino, Supervisor, Behavioral Health
- Julio Caracciolo, Psychiatric Social Worker
- Kareen Lewis, Behavioral Health Associate
- Naylani Batista, Per Diem Psychiatric Social Worker
Pressed into Service During a NYC Code Blue
This past winter, New York’s coldest in 23 years, was especially hard on unhoused city dwellers. Over two incredibly cold weeks in late January and early February, New York City issued a Code Blue emergency—meaning the temperature was so low that it put New Yorkers living outdoors at risk of hypothermia, frostbite and possibly death.
To assist during the emergency, the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) asked VNS Health to send our Mobile Crisis Float Team out to do overnight street outreach in Manhattan. The assignment was for one night only.
Before the Mobile Crisis Float team began their first shift near Penn Station, team members went shopping for protein bars, hats, scarves and gloves. “We wanted to give people something they could use, to start building trust,” says Dierdre. And that’s exactly what they did, connecting with a number of individuals and assessing them for safety, behavioral health concerns, and medical needs while linking them to critical resources.
The morning after that first Code Blue night, DOHMH was so impressed by the Mobile Crisis Float Team’s one-night results, the city decided to keep them on outreach. “I was so proud of this team,” says Deirdre. “I know they put their heart and soul into every interaction with an unhoused individual.”
What was originally to be just a single night of outreach was extended to a 14-day deployment. During that time, the team engaged 131 unhoused New Yorkers. Some accepted rides to warming centers. Others needed emergency care, including one person with frostbite whom the team persuaded to get into an ambulance. DOHMH later sent the team a note of thanks for their outstanding work.
When Deirdre shared the news of the Outstanding Team Performance Award with the rest of the team, they were shocked and thrilled. For Deirdre herself, the award is an important reminder of the impact that comes from working together as a team. “One person makes a drop in the ocean,” she says. “The team is the ripple that spreads out.”