Staff photo / Dan Pompili Duane Piccirilli, Mahoning County Mental Health and Recovery Board executive director, front, addresses the audience at the board’s annual Mental Health and Recovery Awards luncheon Friday at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Social Hall in Youngtown. He was joined at the event by Tia Marcel Moretti, chief advisor for the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, left.

YOUNGSTOWN — May is National Mental Health Awareness Month and Mahoning County took the opportunity Friday to make everyone aware of those who serve the cause and the community well.

The Mahoning County Mental Health and Recovery Board honored this year’s Mental Health and Recovery Award winners at its annual recognition luncheon at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Social Hall.

The featured honorees included Mahoning County Commissioner Carol Rimedio-Righetti, the United Way of Youngstown and Mahoning Valley, and Cathy Grizinski — the longtime director at the Help Network of Northeast Ohio (Help Hotline), who died in December.

“We call it recognizing our champions among champions and we recognize people at all levels of our system, because it takes all of us to deal with the mental health and addiction crisis affecting our community,” said Duane Piccirilli, MCMHRB executive director. “When the bank explosion happened downtown, they organized all the social services downtown and they could act very quickly so it was public-private partnership.”

Bob Hannon, president of the United Way of Youngstown and Mahoning Valley , said the Community Impact Award — made specially for this year’s event — is a big deal to them.

“One of our big things is that we want to be the backbone, to bring the right people together if there’s ever a tragedy,” he said. “We want to be able to take a bad situation and make it as easy as possible on the people who are impacted.”

Hannon said the city’s request to relocate and support more than 100 people in less than four days was a big ask, but the United Way was prepared because of recent major crises like the COVID-19 pandemic.

“So our goal was to find the right partners to help the people at International Towers and Realty Tower, and we brought in Catholic Charities, we brought in MYCAP, Goodwill, the Salvation Army, and we all worked together,” he said.

Rimedio-Righetti received one of MHRB’s highest awards, the Eagle Award.

“We say the eagle flies above the fray and takes care of the situation,” Piccirilli said.

He praised Rimedio-Righetti for her many years of support for the cause in the different government offices she’s held, especially her efforts to save what is now called the Campus of Care in Austintown, the former Youngstown Development Center.

Rimedio-Righetti said she’s only a part of a larger team.

“Thank yourselves because I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for this team being here to help me,” she said.

Like Hannon’s United Way, she told the crowd that when she learned YDC was to be closed, she knew it would take a village to respond to a looming crisis.

“I called Duane, I called (Mahoning County Board of Developmental Disabilities Superintendent) Bill Whitacre, I called (MCBDD board member) Gary O’nesti and we all went, and that was the start of the closing, to relocate so many of our individuals who are so fragile to facilities all over the state,” she said. “So when I went back to work, I said this is it, we are going to buy that property.”

Rimedio-Righetti praised Piccirilli and the MCMHRB Board, Western Reserve Port Authority, and the Mahoning County Commissioners at the time, as well as many others in the room for making the purchase and redevelopment and operation of the facility possible.

“Without you people and your organizations we wouldn’t be here and that wouldn’t be a thriving community,” she said.

Other award winners included:

* Front Line Staff of the Year: Takiyah Anderson, OCPC, YUMADAOP

* Leader of the Year: Cassandra Valentini, Direction Home of Eastern Ohio

* Advocate of the Year: Jionaa Gillins

* CIT Officer of the Year: Officer James Ritter, Struthers Police Department

* Program of the Year: Survivors of Suicide Support Group, Laura Haas and Nicole

Balog-Bickerstaff

“Mahoning County is seeing a very large spike in suicide and we’re trying to provide support,” said Piccirilli of that program, “because someone who has experienced suicide in their family, they’re very much at risk of mental health issues or depression.”

Grizinski’s family was present to receive the plaque that will be placed on a gazebo in August.

“Cathy was a pillar in our community, she was the heart and soul behind the Help Hotline,” Piccirilli said.

The area around the gazebo will be made into a serenity garden in her memory.

He said the awards and the luncheon are important because the job of providing mental health, disability, and addiction services is not an easy one.

“It’s not easy in mental health and less and less people are going into our field,” Piccirilli said. “So a celebration like this is going to show people that our agencies are good places to work, they’re good employers and they help a lot of people.”