Health & Wellness Town Hall Meetings

This year, the Florida Bar created a Special Committee on Mental Health and Wellness of Florida Lawyers to help identify ways it can destigmatize mental illness within our legal community and recommend practices to improve both the Bar’s rules and programming. As part of its efforts to raise awareness and partner with other members of the legal community, the Committee will host several town hall meetings this year to discuss potential initiatives and receive input on ways to accomplish these goals.  Initiatives may include the creation of peer-counseling resources, enhanced member benefits that focus on physical exercise, diet, personal health, and stress reduction training and exercises, creating dedicated CLE courses on mental-health training, identifying and distributing handbooks and toolkits to help guide law firms and other employers on best practices, and creating an online support group or hotline.

The Committee will host several town halls in the coming months around the state as noted below. The town hall meetings are open to all members of the Florida Bar. We hope you can attend, share your stories and provide input as to how you think the Bar can help improve the mental health and wellness of its lawyers.

  • Tallahassee   February 20, 2018 11:30am-1:00pm, FSU Law School in Tallahassee
  • St. Petersburg March 2, 2018 | 11:30am-1:00pm, St. Petersburg Bar Association; Location TBA
  • Gainesville March 16, 2018 | 11:45am-2:00pm, EJCBA Luncheon & CLE, The Wooly – 20 N. Main Street, Gainesville, FL 32601
  • Palm Beach April 18, 2018, Palm Beach Bar Association; Location TBA

YLD AFFILIATE HEALTH & WELLNESS GRANTS NOW AVAILABLE- APPLY BY FEB. 16TH

The Florida Bar Young Lawyers Division is encouraging all local Affiliates to host events to promote health and wellness in their legal communities. Affiliates may apply for a Health & Wellness Grant and receive up to $500 towards their activity focused on mental and physical health and wellness.  The deadline to apply is Friday, February 16, 2018.  You may download the application here Visit flayld.org/mental-health-wellness for more details about the YLD’s focus this year on health and wellness.