Nami Minnesota

Filing Period

Jul 1, 2010 to Jun 30, 2011

Signed

Nov 18, 2011

Return Version

2010v3.4

Gross Receipts

$1,349,705

Mission

Major Activities

Activity 2

Support: nami offered 49 ongoing peer-to-peer support groups statewide for family members, adults living with a mental illness, parents of children, spouses/partners, veterans and lgbtq-identified people. In addition to support groups, nami offers kidshops, a class for children with a sibling or parent with a mental illness. Nami also trains the mentors for the veterans' mental health court in hennepin county. Nami fielded over 4,000 telephone calls last year from people seeking advice and resources. Nami wrote and published seven booklets on a variety of topics (mental health system, data practices, criminal justice system, etc.), with an eighth on juvenile justice expected this fall.

Activity 3

Advocacy: in an effort to reduce stigma and increase understanding about mental illnesses, staff and volunteers conducted 98 presentations to 3,500 people at workplaces and major conferences. These presentations included in our own voice, understanding stigma, mental illnesses in the workplace and mental illness 101. Nami had booths at over 20 events, including all major mental health conferences, jail resource fairs, health fairs and the minnesota state fair. Over 5,000 booth visitors received pencils after taking a quiz, and inscribed on the pencil was "erase stigma - write a new future for mental illness." this year a rubber bracelet will be handed out with "changing minds" on it. Nami has collaborated with twin cities public television (tpt) to produce three videos - on adult mental health, children's mental health and returning soldiers, and developed two others on our own on jail discharge planning and residential treatment for children. Each includes real people sharing their stories, since the most effective way to reduce stigma is through personal stories. The videos are posted on youtube and are aired periodically on tpt. Nami uses traditional methods, social media and e-marketing to disseminate information to people throughout the state. A regular e-blast is sent twice per month to nearly 5,000 people and a namiwalk e-blast goes out to twice that many. Nami has over 1,000 facebook fans, and we have increased our fans by 25% in the last 6 months. Nami also provides information and news through our twitter account, @namiminnesota. We currently have over 500 followers and tweet and retweet between 2 and 10 times per day. The advocate newsletter is sent to 6,000 people on a quarterly basis, including members, licensed mental health providers, all legislators and members of local advisory committees on mental health. Nami actively sends press releases, editorials, letters to the editor and columns to newspapers across the state. This last fiscal year 221 newspapers published 1,342 nami articles. The nami minnesota website received over 23,433 unique visitors and 40,017 total visitors, with a 55% increase in new visitors compared to the previous year. Public policy is an important part of nami's mission. Nami minnesota is viewed as a leader in the public policy arena, educating candidates, elected officials and state and county staff on mental illnesses, effectiveness of programs and unmet needs. Nami staff and volunteers are represented on over 40 different committees and advisory committees. Nami is viewed as an important collaborator and frequently brings together interested parties to create consensus on major issues such as the use of seclusion and restraints in the schools and licensing of corporate foster care. Nami has conducted targeted work on specific issues such as the criminalization of mental illness and custody relinquishment.

Filer

EIN

41-1317030