CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – (CLARKSVILLENOW) – Soldiers and Families Embraced (SAFE) is a local non-profit organization dedicated to offering mental health counseling to active-duty service members, military veterans, and their families.

The organization has undergone some recent changes to ensure that SAFE reaches veterans or veterans’ families who are struggling with mental health or depression.

Lantz Smith is the newly-appointed executive director of SAFE, and like those whom SAFE is trying to reach, Smith is a veteran.  The entire staff at SAFE consists of veterans or veterans’ spouses, which helps establish an environment of what Smith calls cultural competence.

“We know this population because we are this population,” Smith said in an interview on Clarksville’s Conversation.  “We know a lot of the hardships that some of our soldiers and families have endured, because…we’ve been there; we’ve done those things.  We recognize the impacts that it has on mental health.”

With Smith’s appointment as SAFE’s executive director, the organization has also begun a new intake process for anybody interested in their services.  Once a potential client fills out their information – which goes only to Smith or SAFE’s program director, Amy Fidler – on SAFE’s website, Smith or Fidler reach out for a phone assessment.  Afterwards, the client is connected with their provider to complete the first intake.  This removes the need for a client to give their information twice, first to the organization, and then again to their counselor.  Smith says that this gets clients into helpful sessions more quickly.

SAFE does not operate under the Department of Defense, Veterans Affairs, or any other governmental agency.  Funded entirely by private donations and grants, SAFE is able to maintain greater control over client confidentiality.  Their relative autonomy also allows them to keep their waiting list small.

In their effort to offer the best assistance possible to veterans and their families, SAFE also has a new location at 1812 Haynes Street, near Publix on Memorial Drive.

SAFE hosts an annual breakfast fundraiser for the community, with this year’s event scheduled for Thursday, November 8.

To learn more about SAFE, visit the Soldiers and Families Embraced website.  If you are interested in requesting SAFE’s services, you can go here.  You can also follow them on their Facebook page.  To hear the full interview with Lantz Smith on Clarksville’s Conversation, go here.