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PROJECT OBJECTIVES AND NEEDS:
To raise awareness and provide support of the Mental Health Challenges in the Greater Inland Empire which includes the Riverside and San Bernardino Counties in California. The global pandemic has brought attention to another aspect of health often overlooked: Mental Health, Depression, anxiety, addiction, and suicide are widespread in the Greater Inland Empire and too often seen as things to be ashamed of and kept quiet. Nearly 1 in 5 adults in the Inland Empire live with a mental illness (51.5 million in 2019) and an estimated one in 20 adults have a serious mental illness (13.1 million) that substantially interferes with major life activities. These statistics are even higher for adolescents, where half of teens have had a mental disorder in their lifetimes and 22 percent have had a severe impairment.
-The suicide rate is much higher among seniors (60+) compared to youth (9-17) in both the Riverside and San Bernardino Counties. While seniors are only 17% of the population. older adults account for 31.5% of suicide deaths. In 2020 the suicide rate for seniors was over 4 times higher than for youth in Riverside County. In contrast, youth aged 10-17 make up a much smaller percentage of suicide deaths, around 5-7% in recent years. However, suicide is still the 3rd leading cause of death for individuals aged 15-24 in the Inland Empire.
- 2024 California legislation shifts $140 million annually of existing tax revenue for mental health, drug, and alcohol treatment from the counties to the state control of mental health funding to the state to build facilities and have more treatment beds to institutionalize extremely serious cases of mental illness. However, this is at the expense of reduced funding for preventive and early intervention mental health programs in San Bernardino and Riverside Counties. There is a need for Interventions like early childhood programs, skills-building for youth, and community-level initiatives to promote protective factors. Identifying emerging mental health issues early on, prevention-focused programs can provide timely support and treatment to stop problems from escalating into more serious, chronic conditions.
One object is to retrain the community in the early identification of signs and symptoms of mental illness to provide them with access to mental health services and other tools available for them.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
This project will train youth, teachers, parents, and seniors to recognize the early signs of mental health illness, provide a safe space to those suffering, and direct them to the resources needed to help with their struggles so they don't take extreme measures. This program will initially be offered to the schools in the Inland Empire and then to family service organizations in the community. According to Rim Family Services in the community, "stigma" as it relates to mental health is a large issue. Stigma reduction is a big piece of the current funding that will be going away. Stigma is prevalent everywhere but is especially prevalent and thrives in rural communities. Programs will be developed for intergenerational programs that interface youth with seniors to help alleviate depression and loneliness among older adults. A Mobile Resource Center will be developed to provide mental health support to the those in need in remote locations.
PROJECT SCOPE:
To strengthen the social and emotional skills in all age groups. This will be a starting point to reduce lack of self-esteem, confidence, depression, use of drugs and lack of empathy. This will result in early intervention to alleviate illiteracy, decrease student dropout rate and reduce the suicide rate at all age groups.
PROJECT PARTNERS:
Inland Empire School system
School Mentoring Programs
Rim Family Services
Senior Centers
Vocational training organizations
Assisted Living Facilities
Private Nutritional and Hygiene Partners
BENEFICIARIES:
Early Youth, adolescents, families and seniors. Over the last 5 years, Riverside County reported 1393 suicide deaths and 14,576 non-fatal self-harm injuries from suicide attempts. Youth aged 25 and under constituted 195 of the deaths and half of the non-fatal self-harm injuries. The suicide rate in Riverside and San Bernardno Counties was 11.9 and 11.2 respectivley per 100,000 in 2018-2020, significantly higher than the statewide 10.5 per 100,0000. In San Bernardino County the suicide rate was in California for ages 5-14 have been doubling from 2019 to 2020.
Victims of human trafficking, especially domestic minor sex trafficking, often suffer severe, physical, emotional and sexual abuse at the hands of their traffickers. They frequently have histories of emotional, phusical, and/or sexual abuse prior to being trafficked which compounds the mental health impacts.
COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT:
Local mental health organizations.
Youth organizations to work with seniors in the community
Hospital Mental Health Units
Local Rotary Club support of Early Act, Interact and Rotaract
Rotary Youth Leadership Academy (RYLA)
SUSTAINABILITY:
- Key is to partner with the schools
- Training and Distribution of manuals
- Train the trainers with community representation who will conrribute their knowledge, experience, and diversity of culture
- Develop training material
- Subsidize computer tablets and wifi service for needy students
- Student assistance to Seniors in the use of the internet for medical and social media
- Assist in establishing social fellowship programs of common interest
FUNDING:
- Educational materials - $10k
- Purchase of office material - $2k
- Purchase of Educational support equipment - projectors, screens, monitors $6k
- computer tablets, laptops and desktops -$15k
- Professional assistance in training the trainer - $10k
- Social Interaction equipment equipment for both youth and seniors (games, art supplies, musical instruments, etc) - $12k
- Skills-building equipment for youth and self-sufficiency equipment for seniors - $12k
- Promotional Media Costs to reduce the stigma and increase awareness, making it easier for people to seek help early before problems worsen. - $15k
- Mobile Resource Van to bring services and resources into our isolated communities. - $57,480
- Project Mgt Contigency funding 12% - $18,973
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