Last week, we received a gift that couldn’t have come at a better time.
Rob Katz, CEO of Vail Resorts, and his wife, Elana Amsterdam, made a personal contribution of $250,000 to Park City Community Foundation in support of prevention efforts related to mental health and substance abuse among young people.
In the past few months, Park City Community Foundation has been working with a broad coalition of community members and leaders to create the new Summit County Mental Wellness Alliance. Prevention efforts among youth are a key part of that work.
The alliance is aimed at improving community awareness of mental health and substance abuse, increasing access to effective treatment, and increasing effective prevention efforts.
The youth prevention part of that work will follow the national Communities That Care framework, an evidence-based approach that has proven very successful in improving outcomes among young people in other communities in Utah and elsewhere.
The gift from Mr. Katz and Ms. Amsterdam will equip the Community Foundation and its partners with the resources necessary to move forward and fully take on this issue. The first meeting of the Communities That Care workgroup had already been scheduled for April 17, and we were able to announce at that meeting that we now have the resources to launch with confidence and on a fast track toward impact.
This is the second gift from the Katz/Amsterdam family to Park City Community Foundation in support of a key community initiative (they gave a similar amount last year to enable PC Tots to add a second early childhood care/education facility). Every day, we see the strong community commitment shown in greater Park City by the whole Vail Resorts family.
This gift is part of $1.6 million donated to nonprofits benefitting communities where Vail Resorts operates. For more details, please see the press release from Vail Resorts.
Learn more about Park City Community Foundation’s work on mental wellness.