Mentis Napa, a nonprofit dedicated to providing mental health support to Napa County residents, is hosting its second annual suicide prevention conference on Wednesday, Sept. 17, from 2:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Yountville Community Center.
The free event coincides with Suicide Prevention Awareness Month and is part of a larger set of community efforts, including restaurant fundraisers and city proclamations, to raise awareness and support prevention work across Napa County.
Suicide awareness — and mental health in general — is also a pillar of Mentis Napa’s work: Each year, Mentis provides affordable clinical care to more than 1,000 people. Its free prevention programs — teaching coping skills, suicide awareness and mental health literacy — reach an additional 4,000 residents annually. It is the only mental health provider in Napa serving uninsured individuals and one of the few accepting Medi-Cal.
The second annual event will be at the Yountville Community Center for free. People who want to attend can register online.
The event includes a resource fair staffed with nonprofits, including the Monarch Justice Center, Up Valley Family Centers, NEWS Domestic Violence and Sexual Abuse Services, the Napa Opioid Safety Coalition, LGBTQ Connection and the Depression Bipolar Support Alliance.
The conference will include panels focused on building protective factors for older adults and veterans at risk for suicide. During the panels, local experts will share practical tools and strategies centered on strengthening community connection, supporting emotional well-being and improving access to services.
The Trevor Project, a national nonprofit focused on suicide prevention, crisis intervention and support for LGBTQ+ young people, will lead a live, interactive “ally training.” The two-hour session is designed to help participants better support LGBTQ+ youth by deepening their understanding of terminology, the coming out process and challenges LGBTQ+ youth may face at home, in school and in the community.
A separate virtual LGBTQ+ ally training will also be offered. This online cultural competency session will create space for dialogue around being an ally. A Zoom link will be sent to participants in advance.
The event also includes an optional dinner, which costs $20.
The evening will close with keynote speaker Lisa Gift, a Calistoga city councilmember and longtime Napa County resident. Gift, who is a single mother, suicide attempt survivor and mental health advocate, will share her personal journey facing mental health challenges while in public office. Gift publicly recounted her ordeal — in extraordinarily candid detail — in a series of Instagram posts in January 2023, just eight days after her suicide attempt.
Gift went public with the experience, she said, to help remove the stigma from psychological conditions and to call attention to what she perceived as inadequate care in the immediate wake of the incident.
She will bring that same candid attention to her keynote speech on Wednesday, emphasizing the importance of reducing stigma, normalizing conversations about emotional well-being and treating mental health struggles with the same openness and compassion as physical illness.
“There’s real value in this year having someone who’s so super local. Suicide can invoke this kind of fear and anxiety in people, but talking about it can feel reassuring because there is a network here and people are helping each other,” Mentis Napa Development Director Charlotte Hajer said.
How to get help: