2022 Spring Celebration

May 19, 2022

AMCS Raises MORE THAN $350,000 at Spring Celebration

to Support Community Mental Health

Community mental health supporters rallied on May 19 at the Drollinger Family Stage on the campus of Loyola Marymount University to raise more than $350,000 to support Airport Marina Counseling Service’s (AMCS) efforts to deliver low-cost community mental health services and train new therapists at the organizations 18th annual “Spring into Well-Being” Celebration.

The event celebrated AMCS’s 2022 Community Builder, Commissioner Valeria Velasco, who has spent decades giving back to the local community through a variety of organizations.

“We are so excited that the community recognizes the important role AMCS plays in making sure everyone has access to mental health services,” said AMCS CEO Eden Garcia-Balis. “We were excited to honor Val Velasco for all she has done to help the community we serve.”

The event, emceed by retired NBC4 Weathercaster Fritz Coleman, attracted hundreds of key local community and business leaders, including Los Angeles City Councilman Mike Bonin, and raised more than $350,000 to continue to support the clinic’s mission to provide affordable, community-based mental health services and to support the training of more than 60 mental health therapists each year.

AMCS is a nonprofit, community-based mental health clinic that has been serving the greater LAX region since 1961. From its opening in 1961 to now, AMCS has continued to grow and expand it programs and services. Today, the Clinic serves hundreds of individuals, children and families and couples weekly, and its services are provided on a sliding-scale basis.

As affordable mental health resources become more difficult to find, more people living further away from AMCS depend upon its services. Though the Clinic has no geographical boundaries, AMCS currently serves the greater LAX area including Westchester, El Segundo, Culver City, Hawthorne, Inglewood, Marina del Rey, Playa del Rey and Venice, Santa Monica, Torrance, South Los Angeles and extended areas of Los Angeles County. AMCS offers comprehensive therapeutic services to individuals, children and families, couples and older adults, many of whom would otherwise have little access to counseling.  Open seven days a week, Airport Marina Counseling Service provides an array of successful programs, both at the Clinic and off-site, to meet the needs of people of all ages.