Henderson County funder awards $105,000

PJ staff report | June 28, 2011

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HENDERSONVILLE, N.C. -- The Community Foundation of Henderson County has awarded over $105,000 in grants to two initiatives that aim to improve access to behavioral health services for underserved people in the community.

The grant recipients were selected from among seven requests submitted in response to a request for proposals that encourage existing groups to collaborate and develop ideas to address current or anticipated gaps in the delivery of behavioral-health services.

The foundation, founded in 1982, encouraged organizations to develop projects that "reflect a creative, collaborative and interdisciplinary effort" to use "existing community resources as appropriate."

One grant, for nearly $46,000, will support a collaborative project between Pisgah Legal Services, the lead agency, and Hendersonville Rescue Mission.

Modeled on a national initiative, the project aims to serve adults who are homeless or at risk of homelessness, and who have mental illness, as well as mental-health and substance-abuse disorders or other serious health conditions, or both, by helping them gain access to benefits to which they are entitled that will improve their lives.

The second grant, for $60,000, will support a collaborative effort involving four agencies that aims to address the need to improve access to behavioral health and addiction counseling services.

The effort will place a behavioral-health counselor who also will be a licensed clinical-addiction specialist on site at Mainstay Domestic Violence Center, at Hendersonville Rescue Mission, and in the Henderson County Public Schools to provide assessment, individual counseling and group support for those needing mental-health and addiction services.

Blue Ridge Community Health Services is the lead agency.

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