Speakers at the session included Mike Fitzpatrick, M.S.W., executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI); Barbara Van Dahlen, Ph.D., founder and president of Give an Hour; Kimberly Gleason, eastern division director at the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP); and Sarah Steverman, director of state policy at Mental Health America (MHA).

“We need to publicize each other’s local community programs,” said Fitzpatrick. “Building capacity locally— that’s where the action is.”

Van Dahlen noted that Give an Hour recently collaborated with APA’s American Psychiatric Foundation on the production of two new public-service announcements about the Community Blueprint Network, a collaborative cross-sector initiative focused on promoting and improving support services for military members and their families.

Both Gleason and Steverman spoke of how their growing number of community-based chapters can benefit from increased interaction with local clinicians and APA branches.