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Federal Updates "Big Beautiful Bill" Becomes Law
Earlier this month, Congress passed the controversial "Big Beautiful Bipartisan Budget Agreement" finalizing the federal budget for FY2025. While the bill was marketed as compromise, it carries significant policy implications that threaten the well-being of children, youth, and families in New York and beyond.
Key concerns include:
Medicaid Cuts: With significant reductions to Medicaid, the bill risks rolling back coverage for millions including youth who rely on behavioral and mental health services.
Education and Community Schools: Spending caps could limit future investments in Title I and other essential education programs, putting under-resourced schools and community supports at risk of flat or reduced funding in coming years.
Child Welfare and Behavioral Health: Decreased federal investments could undermine trauma-informed care, family support services, and prevention programs across the state.
FTNYS continues to work with our national and state partners to monitor implementation and advocate for state-level protections that shield our communities from these cuts.
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Are you interested in growing your Family Peer or Youth Peer Program?
Check out a video series on programmatic and organizational growth and capacity building! This two-part series features five videos and resource handouts covering key practices like identifying funding sources, developing grants, and collaborating with community partners. You'll also learn about core principles of capacity building and peer leadership.
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Disability Pride & Minority Mental Health Awareness Month July is a great time for family and youth peers, and family-led agencies to spark conversations about pride, mental health, and how different identities may overlap.
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Disability Pride
Disability Pride Month happens in July because the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed on July 26, 1990. The first official celebration was in 2015 for the ADA’s 25th anniversary.
This year’s theme, picked by The Arc’s National Council of Self-Advocates, is “We Belong Here, and We're Here to Stay.” It sends a strong message: disabled people aren’t on the sidelines, they’re at the heart of every community.
Disability pride is about rejecting shame and embracing disability as a vital part of who someone is.
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Minority Mental Health
July is also known as Bebe Moore Campbell National Minority Mental Health Awareness Month, or BIPOC Mental Health Month, created to highlight the unique needs and barriers that Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color face. For many, finding mental health care that truly understands culture and lived experience can still be tough.
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Take a Free Mental Health Screening Test!
Your mental health matters. Please click the the photo to the right to access Mental Health America's free and confidential screening tool. The online screening only takes a few minutes and can help you better understand what you're feeling and connect you to helpful resources.
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Mental Wellness Confronting the Mental Health Crisis in 2025: Black/Brown/Latino and Indigenous communities.
In 2025, minority communities continue to face a mental health crisis fueled by persistent systemic racism and historical trauma. These forces have created massive disparities in who receives care, how they are treated, and whether their mental health needs are even recognized in the first place.
A May 2024 Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) survey illustrates this disparity with chilling clarity: among adults who report fair or poor mental health, only 39% of Black adults received mental health services in the past three years, compared to 50% of White adults. Hispanic adults fared even worse, with only 36% accessing care.
Higher Rates of Mental Illness: Approximately 19.6% of American Indian & Alaskan Native adults experienced a mental illness within the past year, with 7.3% experiencing a serious mental illness. A substantial percentage of Indigenous individuals seeking mental health care report their needs are not fully met, with some facing barriers to accessing services
Behind these numbers are millions of individuals suffering in silence, navigating a healthcare system not designed for their healing. The result? Delayed treatment, increased emotional distress, and lives lost to preventable mental health conditions.
But the crisis doesn't stop at adulthood.
A Growing Storm: Mental Health Challenges Among Minority Youth
Minority youth today are facing unprecedented mental health challenges. Rates of depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation among Black, Indigenous and Latino children and teens exceed those of their “non-minority” peers. Yet these young people are far less likely to receive support, and more likely to be punished, suspended from school or become victims of the Juvenile Justice System. The trauma experienced is shaped in part by environmental racism, community violence, poverty, social media, over-policing and school-based discrimination. The chronic stress of navigating a world that often treats them as “bad” instead of as young people in need of help only adds to their stress and burden.
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Systemic Barriers to Mental Health Care
The root causes of these disparities are both historic and structural. According to the American Psychiatric Association’s Mental Health Facts for African Americans, Black individuals are: Less likely to receive guideline-consistent care; Less frequently included in mental health research; More likely to rely on emergency rooms or primary care instead of mental health specialists. Even when services are available, they often fail to reflect the lived experiences, values, or culture of minorities they are serving. This is why culturally competent and culturally congruent care is essential.
Cultural Congruency: Healing Through Identity and Connection
Cultural congruency means aligning care with a person’s cultural values, beliefs, identity, and lived experience. It’s not just about inclusion it’s about transformation. For Black communities, this means:
- Recognizing the impact of racism and historical trauma
- Using culturally relevant language, communication, and practices
- Building authentic, trust-based relationships between providers and clients
Culturally congruent care improves mental health outcomes, builds trust, and restores dignity to those who have been dismissed, misunderstood, or mistreated in the mental health system.
The Path Forward: From Disparity to Equity
To address the mental health crisis in the Black community, we must:
- Expand access to culturally responsive mental health services
- Fund and uplift community-led, peer-based support programs that provide cultural adaptations and competency.
- Normalize mental wellness and dismantle stigma
- Invest in prevention and early intervention, especially for youth
- Hold systems accountable for equity in outcomes not just access
Minority Wellness Is Revolutionary
Mental wellness is not a luxury. It is a birthright. In a world that has tried to dim the light, reclaiming joy, balance, and mental well-being is a radical act of self-love and resistance.
Let 2025 be the year we break the silence. Let it be the year to demand systems that see us, hear us, and serve us with justice.
Kim D. Kaiser
Director of Community Engagement for Inclusion and Equity
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Join the FTNYS Youth Mental Health Advisory Board
Your Voice Matters!
Are you a young person (ages 14–28) passionate about mental health, advocacy, and creating real change in your community? We want YOU to be part of the Youth Mental Health Advisory Board (YMHAB) — a statewide movement led by youth, for youth.
What is the Youth Mental Health Advisory Board? (YMHAB)
The Youth Mental Health Advisory Board is a dynamic, youth-led group working to ensure that youth voice is at the center of mental health policy, practice, and system reform in New York State. We meet regularly to share lived experiences, spotlight system gaps, and help shape the future of youth mental health services across NYS.
What We Do?
- Share our stories to influence change at state and local levels.
- Advise policymakers, agencies, and providers on what youth really need.
- Help launch programs like youth peer support, awareness campaigns, and training initiatives.
- Build leadership skills through advocacy training and mentorship opportunities.
Why Join?
- Be a changemaker in your community.
- Collaborate with other passionate youth from across NY.
- Get support, training, and opportunities to grow as a leader.
- Influence real-world policies that affect youth every day.
We’re Recruiting in All 5 NYS Regions:
Whether you’re from:
- Western NY (Buffalo, Niagara Falls, Rochester)
- Central NY (Syracuse, Utica, Binghamton)
- Capital Region (Albany, Troy, Schenectady)
- Hudson Valley (Poughkeepsie, Newburgh, White Plains)
- NYC & Long Island
We want youth voices from every corner of the state!
| | Click each social media application to access our page! | | | | |
737 Madison Avenue
Albany, NY 12208
Office Phone: 518.432.0333
Information Email: info@ftnys.org
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