Mental Health Forum
As
one of the “Neighbourhood Small Grants Projects” sponsored by Cedar
Cottage Neighbourhood House there
will be a forum on mental health policy on Wednesday October 28th
from 7:00 - 8:30 pm at St Margaret's Cedar
Cottage Anglican Church, 1530 22nd Avenue East , Vancouver. Originally
we were planning a Mental Health Fair
but due to funding
constraints we settled on a mental health forum.
Refreshments will be provided.
The
theme of the forum will be “Mental Health Care In The New Millennium,
Where Do We Go From Here”. We
are hoping to have five speakers on the panel. One from each of
the major stakeholder groups, consumer/survivor,
family/friends, service provider/government and alternative treatments.
Each speaker will be given fifteen minutes to
give us their
perspective on where mental health should be going as we approach the
second decade of the new
millennium . This will be followed by refreshments and a question
period. So far
we have as confirmed speakers
Megan Oleson, research co-ordinator from the Compassion Club and Ron
Carten, Executive Director/ Coordinator
of the West Coast Mental Health
Network, Marge Johnson the B.C. Schizophrenia Society plus Coast
Foundation have also
indicated they will sending a representative.
On
behalf of the organizing committee I would like to invite you to come
and be part of this forum as we believe it
is important to bring in the perspectives of each of the major
stakeholder groups. My experience as a consumer
survivor, mental health worker, and as one of the organizers of the
Provincial Mental Policy Forum has shown to me
that each group
has their own special needs and concerns.
We
look forward to your participation in the discussion/question period,
as we believe your input would be valuable
and give us your unique perspective on the issues involved in how
mental health services are provided.
We
will inviting the public to attend this event through advertising in
community newsletters, on bulletin boards at
Community Centres, Mental Health Centres, & other places the public
might visit. We will also asking other Mental
Health Agencies to let their members know about the event.
We will also try to provide space for displays and information booths (space permitting).
We look forward to there being fifty people at the event.
If you have any questions, need further information or want to volunteer in putting on the forum please feel free to contact me Alex Verkade at 604-872-3065 or via e-mail at verkade@telus.net or Evelyn Teichman at evelyn6@telus.net