Recap
Community Turns Out for Youth Mental Health Town Hall
On Thursday, June 25, nearly 100 community members gathered at the Palo Alto Art Center for a Youth Mental Health Town Hall. PACF was honored to serve as a co-sponsor, alongside partners from the City of Palo Alto, the offices of Santa Clara County Supervisor Margaret Abe-Koga and State Assembly member Marc Berman, Youth Community Service, and Project Safety Net.
The evening revealed something profoundly hopeful: that young people and their well-being matter deeply to all of us, and that lasting solutions are possible when a community works together.
"Showing up may be half the battle,” shares Board President Becky Beacom, who represented PACF at the event. “But when an entire community comes together on behalf of its young people, it reveals something profoundly hopeful: that young people and their well-being matter deeply to all of us, and that lasting solutions are possible when a community works together."
Shared concern, hope, and commitment were on full display as the attendees heard Supervisor Abe-Koga and Assemblymember Berman speak about their efforts to preserve and protect the mental health resources young people depend on, efforts whose importance was powerfully reinforced by the young people and mental health professionals on the panel. Much of the evening's discussion centered on allcove Palo Alto, a youth mental health center serving ages 12 to 25 whose future has been threatened by county funding reductions.
The evening also gave PACF an opportunity to share its long history of partnering with and funding organizations on the front lines of youth mental health, and to spotlight the ongoing Community Campaign calling on the greater community to help raise $25,000 to be matched dollar for dollar in support of allcove Palo Alto.
As Becky put it, reflecting on decades of work in youth mental health: "Real progress is rarely made by any one organization alone. It happens when a community decides to show up and work together." This Town Hall was a clear example of that, one more step toward the lasting solutions our community is working to build.
