Evans City charity raises over $100,000 for suicide prevention
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EVANS CITY – For Evans City mom Deb Smith, suicide prevention is personal.
Smith’s son, Andrew “A.J.” Smith, a former firefighter and veteran who served in Iraq, died by suicide in 2016.
To raise awareness of the risk of suicide and PTSD in the veteran population, Smith and her husband, Jim, founded A.J.'s Stop 22, a community group that gathers funds for suicide prevention. The organization's name references a VA statistic that 22 veterans die from suicide every day.
After six years of raising funds through an annual golf outing, the group has raised a cumulative $108,450 for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
“I’m overwhelmed that we’ve raised that much money,” Smith said. “I never dreamed that we would raise this much money for our small group. We went into this just trying to help us through our grief. If we’ve helped one family, if one person decided not to take their life, it has helped us. That’s our main thing, is just to make some sense out of (A.J.)’s death.”
Deb also worked with other suicide prevention advocates to place 660 flags in Zelienople in honor of veterans who died by suicide.
“We put 660 flags out, (which) represents that we lose 660 veterans a month by suicide,” she said. “It’s to raise awareness and show how many we lose. We put them down there by the church, and it’s an impact statement for us.”
This year’s golf outing was held July 23 at Strawberry Ridge Golf Course in Harmony. Tickets for the annual golf outing are $100 per golfer, organizer Don Checkan said. Each year, typically anywhere between 144 and 180 golfers participate, and tickets typically sell out. This year the outing raised around $20,000.
Participants hail from around the region, Checkan said.
“They’re everywhere. They’re from several counties and out of state,” he said.
“We have one family who comes every year, and they have family coming from five states,” Deb added.
Jesse Putkoski, area director of the Western Pennsylvania Chapter of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, said the funds will benefit a number of causes within the foundation.
“It goes towards educational programs that we present. The Western Pennsylvania chapter covers 25 counties, so it goes to the development and the presentation of those programs throughout all of those areas, including this area,” Putkoski said. “It also goes toward funding scientific research for suicide prevention, and it helps provide programs for people who have been impacted by suicide, so suicide loss survivors and those with lived experience.”
The funds also will help the foundation advocate for mental health resources with the federal and state governments, she added. The programs provided by the foundation center on suicide prevention training.
Putkoski said Deb Smith was one of the foundation’s “biggest supporters,” and thanked her and A.J.’s Stop 22 for their help.
“It’s absolutely incredible. We are so grateful for their support and everything they do,” she said. “I’ve been to the golf outing, and it’s a fantastic event. We are just so grateful to get to partner with her and work with her group. It’s wonderful.”
