Asante Haughton is a lot of things-entrepreneur, activist, organizer, speaker, writer, poet, and mental health worker. His accomplishments include two TEDx talks and being named as one of Canada’s top 150 influencers in mental health. Most notably, he co-founded the Reach Out Response Network, an organization whose advocacy directly paved the way to the Toronto Community Crisis Service, a new fourth emergency service that supports folks in mental health crisis with mobile crisis teams instead of police officers. In his day job, Asante is the Manager of Storytelling at Unsinkable, a mental health organization that amplifies stories for the purpose of awareness and change.
A lover of celebrity gossip and sports analogies, Asante’s passion is for the betterment of all people. He is engaged in the lofty ambition of trying to change the world, one person and one community at a time.
Keynote Speaker
Kimberly R. Murray BA, LLB, LLM, IPC, LL.D. (honoris causa)
Kimberly Murray is a member of the Kanehsatake Mohawk Nation. On June 8, 2022, Ms. Murray was appointed as Independent Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites associated with Indian Residential Schools.
Prior to this new role, she was the Executive Lead for the Survivors’ Secretariat at the Six Nations of the Grand River, working to recover the missing children and unmarked burials at the Mohawk Institute.
Ms. Murray was also the Province of Ontario’s first ever Assistant Deputy Attorney General for Indigenous Justice, from April 1, 2015, to August 2, 2021, where she was responsible for creating a unit to work with Indigenous communities on revitalizing their Indigenous laws and legal orders. In 2018-2019, Ms. Murray chaired the Expert Panel on Policing in Indigenous Communities, which produced the report Toward Peace Harmony, and Well-Being: Policing in Indigenous Communities.
From 2010 to 2015, Ms. Murray was the Executive Director of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada where she worked to ensure that Survivors of Canada’s Indian Residential School System were heard and remembered, and to promote reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people.
From 1995 to 2010, Ms. Murray was staff lawyer and then Executive Director of Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto. She has appeared before all levels of courts on Indigenous legal issues. She has acted as counsel at several coroner inquests and public inquiries – including the Ipperwash Inquiry in Ontario and the Frank Paul Inquiry in British Columbia.
Ms. Murray is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2017 National Aboriginal Achievement Award for Law and Justice. In 2015, the Indigenous Bar Association granted Ms. Murray the Indigenous Peoples’ Counsel (IPC) designation.