STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK
The fourth annual Swing Fore Recovery golf tournament, reception and community-wide raffle will be held Friday, Sept. 20, at Elkhorn Golf Club at Sun Valley Resort.
The 18-hole scramble and community-wide raffle will raise funds for the NAMI-WRV. The community-wide raffle will include such prizes as a Sun Valley Challenger Ski Pass, a BCRD Nordic Ski Pass and two $250 Atkinsons’ gift cards.
Tickets are one for $10 and 20 for $100, available at Chapter One Bookstore in Ketchum, Iconoclast Bookstore in Hailey, both the Ketchum and Hailey Farmers Markets and online at www.namiwrv.org/golf.
Registration for the golf tourney begins at 11 a.m. with tee-off at noon. An evening reception will follow at 5 p.m.
The cost for a foursome for the tournament and reception is $500. The reception alone is $50. To register, contact 208-481-0686 or info@namiwrv.org. Or, visit www.namiwrv/org/golf
The golf tournament, set during National Suicide Prevention Month and National Recovery Month, raises funds for the cost-free suicide prevention and recovery programs offered by the local chapter of the National Alliance for Mental Illness.
“Thanks to the generosity of the many people and businesses that are participating, we are able to make a significant difference in our ability to provide free support groups, educational programs and trainings,” said Page Klune, vice president of the NAMI-WRV board and chair of the golf committee.
During the past year NAMI-WRV has:
- Seen its local support groups quadruple from five to 21 groups per month, offering support for teens, adults and loved ones of those with mental health challenges.
- Expanded its Bluebirds adolescent support group—the first in the nation—from Wood River High School to Wood River Middle School and Silver Creek High School.
- Added a Family Support Group in Ketchum and a Women’s Peer Support Group in Hailey.
- Created a Bluebirds Summer Program for middle and high school students averaging 10 students each meeting.
- Completed an annual 12-Session, 6-week Family to Family Education Program, graduating 13 participants.
- Strengthened its Advisory Council to encompass law enforcement, probation representatives and faith and government leaders.
- Sent Executive Director Christina Cernansky to NAMI’s Train-the-Trainer in Washington, D.C., enabling her to be a state trainer for NAMI program and to train additional leaders for the Wood River Valley program. She also now co-chairs the Idaho Suicide Preventive Action Collective.
NAMI-WRV, founded 18 years ago, is one of only six NAMI chapters in the State of Idaho with others located in places like Boise, Idaho Falls and Coeur d’Alene, said Cernansky.
One in five adults and one and four children live with a mental health challenge for which NAMI seeks to close the gap in mental health services.
In recent years NAMI-WRV has offered a Crisis Intervention Training Program to familiarize first responders and law enforcement with best practices for dealing with individuals with serious mental illness.
NAMI-WRV is now focusing on early intervention, said Cernansky.
A new women’s group meets the second and fourth Wednesdays at the Hailey Sun Club, 731 N. 1st Avenue in Hailey. And a men’s group gathers on the second and fourth Tuesdays. Co-end meetings are held the first and third Tuesdays each month. All meetings are held from 5:30 to 7 p.m.
Family Support Groups are held from 6 to 7:30 p.m. the first Wednesdays of each month at Sun Club South in Hailey and on the third Wednesdays of each month at the YMCA in Ketchum.