Carter honored with Bell Ringer Award

By CHARLES W. JOHNSON News Editor for the Southern Standard

C.N. Womack congratulates Julia Carter after she was given the Bell Ringer Award at the annual CHEER Mental Health banquet Thursday night.

McMinnville?s CHEER Mental Health Association presented its 34th annual Bell Ringer Award to longtime mental health activist and local National Alliance for the Mentally Ill president Julia Carter at its annual banquet Thursday night. CHEER Mental Health past president C.N. Womack made the presentation.

The Bell Ringer Award was created in 1973 to provide a way for the organization to recognize individuals who have made significant contributions to the advancement of mental health issues and the betterment of the community in general.

In presenting the award, Womack talked about Carter?s tireless efforts to provide effective facilities and treatment resources and the extensive work she has done to educate the community about mental health.

?She?s a worker,? Womack said. ?A great worker. She?s a wonderful person. She?s been a great friend to those who are less fortunate, but always recognizing the value and the dignity of every single person. To me, that?s an important thing in life. I have the honor and privilege of presenting her with this Bell Ringer Award.?

In her acceptance speech, Carter thanked her family and all the people who have worked alongside her to further the cause of mental health over the years.

?My family always supports me in everything I do,? Carter said. ?And I also want to thank my NAMI members, because they are my other family.?

In a subsequent interview, Carter said the Bell Ringer Award meant a lot to her because of CHEER?s work in the mental health field.

?I?m very honored,? Carter said. ?I feel mental illness is a devastating disease, and I?m happy all those people at CHEER and the CHEER Board are working so hard to help people with mental illness.?

Carter said it?s important for the community to work together to understand and treat mental illness, rather than suffering in silence, as many families did in the past.

?There are more people out there in our community with mental illness than you realize,? Carter said. ?Once I took the presidency of NAMI, people just seemed to come out of the woodwork. I never knew anything about mental illness until my own daughter was diagnosed. But after that, the more you talked to people, the more people you realize have it in their families.

?I think it?s important that people in the community know that they are not alone when they have someone with this illness,? Carter said.

The first director of CHEER, Dan Smith, gave the banquet?s address, and current CHEER director Janie Stewart presented the 2006 CHEER Employee of the Year awards to children?s clinical care coordinator Susan Moore and adult clinical care coordinator Gary Coppinger.