LA GRANGE — The Red Door Fund for Mental Health (RDF) starts the second year of its campaign to raise awareness and support for mental health in Fayette and Colorado counties.
The RDF, a fund of the Fayette Community Foundation (FCF), has started its 2023 campaign aimed at mental health awareness, education and increasing access to mental health services and providers. The campaign will run through February and the RDF encourages members of the community to decorate the doors to their homes, businesses, classrooms or the fronts of their driveway in red to show their support for mental health.
The RDF started its work in January 2022 with the mission to raise awareness and educate the community on the disproportionate rates of mental illness in rural areas and the lack of support systems in place. In 2022, the RDF raised $17,840, invested $10,850 back into the local community and facilitated several community- led events.
While the RDF aims to continue to raise awareness and educate the community in 2023, the main focus will be increasing access to mental health services and providers. So far in 2023, the RDF has raised $63,000 to be used for this purpose. Methodist Healthcare Ministries awarded a grant to the RDF to work with the community to design and implement a sustainable local solution to the severe mental health provider shortage and the Texas Behavioral Health Funders Collaborative awarded two local school districts, Schulenburg ISD and Weimar ISD, a grant to implement HOPE Squad, a peer-topeer suicide prevention program, on their junior high and high school campuses.
For more information about the RDF visit the FCF website at www.faycofoundation.com.
