In recognition of National Mental Health Awareness Month, the Amarillo Tribune visited Family Support Services to discuss their work. FSS aims to reduce stigma around seeking mental health care, and the nonprofit told us how they are working to meet the growing need, and ways the community can help.
Brandi Reed, CEO of Family Support Services, said she first noticed a local rise in referrals to FSS for counseling services and mental health concerns in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic. During that time, Reed noticed messages spread across the nation and locally, such as “We’re all in this together” and “Take care of yourself.” She speculated that those messages opened the door for mental health conversations, hence the spike in incoming clients.
FSS is an Amarillo nonprofit founded in 1908 that focuses on providing assistance and healing for victims of sexual assault, family violence, and human trafficking; at-risk children, families, and individuals; people in need of individual, group, marital, and family counseling; and veterans, family members of veterans, and surviving spouses.
At the same time, Reed said, the organization was recovering from a fire in January of 2020 that destroyed its former building on Polk Street in downtown Amarillo. Until 2023, when they moved into a new building, located at 2209 SW 7th Ave, FSS saw a rise in area referrals for people struggling with homelessness, substance abuse and use, and people in recovery from domestic violence.
Reed said that because there was more foot traffic in the area around the new building, counselors are more often pulled to help walk-ins or people in immediate crisis. Since then, FSS has continued to see upticks and provided care for women and children survivors of physical and sexual abuse. Reed said she has also seen a rise in teenagers seeking assistance at FSS who are struggling with suicidal ideation, their identity, and self-worth, and abuse in their dating relationships.
“Life is hard for our teenage population these days. There’s a lot of stressors, there’s a lot of peer pressure, there’s a lot more teen dating violence. So we have so many teens that are now filing protective orders, and then they need counseling to heal through that really horrible, scary relationship,” Reed said.
Reed said to meet the growing need, FSS expanded and hired more counselors. She said currently, FSS has six full-time licensed counselors and two part-time licensed counselors. Reed said one of the added counselors is fully dedicated to providing services to veterans.
Benjamin Ramirez, a licensed clinical social worker, said he most commonly provides counseling for people of color and Spanish speakers. He said that counseling is something that everyone can benefit from, regardless of their age, race, gender, or current place in life.
Ramirez said he often helps clients address multiple issues, including layers of trauma and years of events. Reed estimated that around 95% of FSS clients are addressing multiple issues with their counselors. Ramirez said that oftentimes a person will seek counseling for a specific recent event; however, lives and events are interconnected, and other events from as far back as childhood could be affecting a person’s mental health as an adult.
Ramirez said that every person has mental health, just as they have physical health, and should take the time to care for their mental well-being. He said that for every person, if they have not already been taking care of themselves and their mental health, there is no better time than the present.
Ramirez often tells clients the saying, “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”
Reed said that although FSS does work to meet the needs of the community, they still notice a need to break down negative stigmas against seeking mental health care in both the local male population and the Black community. Ramirez said he hopes to help break down those barriers and see more men receiving counseling, especially men of color.
Reed said that to meet the growing need, FSS would like to employ more counselors, but funding for the additional positions is not currently available. Reed said that, initially, FSS hired more counselors, with the plan that the majority of their salaries would be covered by insurance payments to FSS. She said that more often, people in need of their services do not have insurance or cannot afford the co-pays to receive care from their counselors.
“We’ve kind of become that agency that people expect to provide this service, so those positions are not able to bill insurances like they used to, because we’re seeing so many people who are uninsured, and we know that if we weren’t here, where would they go?” Reed said.
She said FSS does not turn away a person in crisis, and that survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence, or human trafficking will be seen and will not pay for their care. “We believe that a survivor should never have to pay for their healing,” Reed said.
Reed said that with the growing need for FSS’s services and the economy impacting clients’ ability to pay, FSS turns to the community to raise funds to support its counselors’ salaries. Reed said that the counselors’ salaries alone account for $600,000 of the FSS budget, and that although they do receive funding from donors and community events, the amount is not sustainable in comparison to the rising need.
“If we don’t start seeing some real support, we will have to change the way that we offer those services, and that might mean that we might have to decrease staff; we might have to really look at that as a possibility,” Reed said.
Reed said she recognizes that a decrease in staff would result in a decrease in services, but said it is up to the community to recognize the importance of mental health and help fund the growth.
“I think this community kind of has to realize if we want these services to be here still, we’re going to have to step in and support them, because the need is greater now,” Reed said.
Donations can be made on the FSS website or by contacting Reed directly at
806-342-2530 or breed@fss-ama.org.
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