By Anna Edwards
The annual Life Worth Living 5K and Walk will be held on Aug. 17 at 9 a.m. at Abbott Farms.
The event raises money for mental health treatment programs and raises awareness for suicide prevention.
The 5k includes a “memorial orchard,” which will display over 50 memorials of loved ones lost to suicide.
Photos set up throughout the apple trees in the orchard commemorate lives lost, many of them Onondaga County teenagers.
“It is incredibly impactful to see the vast number of pictures of loved ones lost to suicide throughout the orchard,” said Robert Helfrich, the creator of the Zach Helfrich Memorial Fund, Inc.
Helfrich created the fund after his son, Zach, tragically took his own life on Aug. 16, 2019.
Zach graduated from Baker High School and was headed to college as a member of the Corps of Cadets – US Army ROTC at Virginia Tech. He worked at Abbott Farms.
The Zach Helfrich Memorial Fund is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that has raised nearly $100,000 to date, according to Helfrich.
He said that the fund aims to “build awareness, support effective treatment programs and reduce the prevalence of suicide among young people in our local communities.”
The fund has established an endowment in Zach’s name to support Upstate Medical University’s Psychiatry High Risk Program, an outpatient treatment center for young people at high risk of suicide.
“Their program has had a phenomenal success and is truly saving young lives,” Helfrich said.
This will be the fifth year of the Life Worth Living 5K, which was first held in 2020 on the first anniversary of Zach Helfrich’s death.
The course will run through the apple orchard and the roads surrounding Abbott Farms.
Visit runsignup.com/lifeworthliving5K to sign up for the 5k or zachmemorial.com for more information.
Other upcoming events that support The Zach Helfrich Memorial Fund include the 4th annual Life Worth Living Golf Tournament being held at Radisson Greens on July 12.
More information can be found at birdease.com/lifeworthliving.
Visit foxfestsyracuse.com to learn more about Fox Fest, a music festival that will be held on Aug. 3, that has selected the Zach Helfrich Memorial Fund as its sole charity beneficiary.
There will also be a suicide awareness fundraiser at WT Brews on July 23.
