Grandview Grief Center seeks city funding, proposes free grief groups and advocacy program

Grandview Family Counseling asked Davis County city leaders to consider funding a proposed Grandview Grief Center in their 2025–26 budgets, saying the center would provide free grief groups for children, teens and parents and a network of grief advocates to connect families with services.

The request came during a presentation to the Davis County Council of Governments. Holly Willard, clinical director of Grandview Family Counseling, said the Grandview Grief Center would pair professional therapists and trained grief advocates who would act like case managers to help families secure basic needs and follow‑up therapy. "Our mission for Grandview for Good is to transform lives through accessible therapy," Willard said.

Willard said the center grew from a private practice model after the clinic found many families could not afford or sustain therapy; she said the Grandview Grief Center received an initial grant from the New York Life Foundation. The center plans eight‑week grief groups for children and a separate parent group to teach caregivers how to support grieving children; Willard said those groups would be offered free of charge. She told the council the center will also form a Grief Center Alliance to coordinate existing local resources rather than replace them.

Willard presented epidemiological context during the talk, saying "one in 15 kids will have a death of a parent or a loved one by the time they're 18." She also cited economic and developmental impacts tied to unaddressed grief and said an early estimate of an affected cohort "equates about to 63,000" (per her presentation) and increases by age 25.

Stephanie Carbajal, clinical director of Carbajal Counseling and Consulting, described a partnership to supply office space and play therapists for grief groups and said the network would serve multiple areas of Davis County, including Kaysville and Syracuse. Willard said the grief advocates would help link families to other local agencies such as Davis Behavioral Health when Medicaid or wraparound services are a better fit.

The presenters asked cities to consider contributions scaled by municipality population; Willard said the requested city allocations were calculated on an enrollment/population basis and that larger cities would be asked for larger contributions while smaller cities would be asked for smaller amounts. The presentation included an invitation to open‑house events and a summary of the program model and research base for play therapy with children.

No formal action or vote on funding occurred at the meeting. The presenters said they would follow up with individual cities and invited site visits and further discussion.