STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK
On Monday 100 Men Who Care will bring together seven professionals to discuss how to address Mental Health and Wellness in the community.
The meeting will be held from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Monday, July 13, in the Minnie Moore Room of the Community Campus in Hailey. Open to the public, it will be followed by a potluck social.
The panelists are:
Jenna Vagias, executive director of TogetherWe
Sarah Seppa, director of community engagement for St. Luke’s Community Health
Benson Blair, a social worker at Wood River High School
Herbert Romero, co-founder of Neighbors Helping Neighbors
Tammy Davis, executive director of the Crisis Hotline
Sonya Wilander, executive director of Men’s Second Chance Living
Kim Hayes, founder of Carbonate Recovery Center
The Crisis Hotline, Men’s Second Chance Living and Carbonate Recovery Center will be the recipients of any donations made during the evening by 100 Men Who Care regulars and others who wish to donate.
100 Men Who Care held its first special topic meeting during the COVID pandemic as it focused on organizations offering assistance during the pandemic. In October 2024 it hosted a community meeting focusing on housing assistance for the lowest income.
The panel that will talk on Monday includes preventative and educational facilitators and intervention and treatment professionals, said Marty Lyon, who founded 100 Men Who Care.
“Their stories are so fascinating and their programs are so uniquely different from one another,” said Lyon. “I learned rom Benson Blair, for instance, that within the high school there are students get trained in suicide prevention and they wear a button to let their fellow students know that if they have an issue they can approach them and have a conversation.
“I learned from Tammy Davis that the Crisis Hotline fielded over 1,400 phone calls during 2025—one year’s time. Sara Seppa said that the number of people that approach St. Luke’s for help is like 20,000 in a given year. And TogetherWe now has 60 organizations under its umbrella.”
100 Men Who Care funneled donations to The Spot Sun Valley, Boulder Mountain Clayworks and The Alliance of Idaho at its last quarterly meeting in April.
The Spot is a professional black box theater in Ketchum known for producing fearless theater and cultivating the next generation of performers. Funds from 100 Men Who Care will help cover the cost of its two tuition-free Spot Young Company musicals. The high school students will perform “Big Fish” in December, and the middle school students will perform “Guys and Dolls Jr.” in May 2027.
Boulder Mountain Clayworks served 150 children in seven Youth Clay camps in 2025, along with 75 middle and high school students in five Teen Throwing Camps. Another 65 individuals participated in one-day or family workshops, and the nonprofit organization took projects to children in Hailey, Bellevue and Carey through the summer Bloom program.
The Alliance of Idaho provides low-cost immigration legal services for families in Blaine County and surrounding communities.