NAMI is a national mental health organization with over 650 affiliates nationwide.

“NAMI Collier is unique because we start with children all the way in serve all the way to seniors,” said the nonprofit’s CEO Beth Hatch.”With the last few years of hurricanes and pandemics, there’s a lot of families with a lot of trauma.”

There’s a stigma that surrounds mental health, and Hatch says the need has increased dramatically, so much that she says, “we need to help get it to get to a point where we treated exactly like physical health.”

With more to be done, expanding to more communities and partners within them is a step in the right direction.

“When the sheriff decided he wanted to do crisis intervention team training, he contacted NAMI Collier,” said Susan Vivonetto, Crisis

Intervention Team Training (CIT) Coordinator for the Coller County Sheriff’s Office.

The Collier County Sheriff’s Office and NAMI work together to break the mental health stigma. Deputies from the department participate in a 40-hour training packed with various teaching tools like lectures, role play, and more.

According to Vivonetto, the CIT training gives law enforcement a better perspective on what’s happening inside someone’s mind. “It just gives them a wider understanding of what it’s like to live with a mental illness and how they can make that whole encounter completely completely different,” added Hatch.

From defining mental health, to the medications most frequently prescribed, deputies are armed with knowledge so they can ask the proper questions and de-escalate situations without using force.

“Sheriff Rambosk’s goal is to have 100% of our law enforcement are certified staff trained in CIT,” said Vivonetto.

The sheriff’s office believes that training all deputies will make them stop and think about how they respond. Deputies can also come back to

NAMI anytime to learn more about the people taking advantage of their services.

Hatch says, “They see first-hand those were serving are our brother, sister’s mom, dad’s neighbors, and coworkers. They see that they’re really working on themselves, and they really have a purpose, and they can treat them differently and know how to respond differently and keep everybody safe.”

If you would like to learn more about NAMI Collier, click here.