Dave Leon has been a social worker in Los Angeles for 20 years. He has extensive experience in front line social work within the public mental health system, psychotherapy within the college system and as an adjunct professor. Dave is also a musician. Now a Co-Executive Director of Painted Brain, he inaugurated the project with a group of artists in 2006 by launching issue one of The Painted Brain magazine.”
Rayshell Chambers
Rayshell Chambers co-founded Painted Brain, a mental health tech nonprofit in Los Angeles that provides peer-based services and practice training in technology and clinical mental health. She is also an independent consultant, including capacity-building support and grant writing for small nonprofits serving communities of color. Her most recent accomplishments include organizing a National Network for Psychiatric Advance Directives and being featured in the Los Angeles Times for her work in the peer mental health sphere. She has dedicated her personal and professional pursuits to designing and advocating for comprehensive health and human service programs that enhance the human condition of the most vulnerable populations.
SHAYDA KAFAI
Shayda Kafai (she/her) is an Assistant Professor of Gender and Sexuality Studies in the Ethnic and Women’s Studies department at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. As a queer, disabled, Mad Iranian femme, she commits to practicing how we can reclaim our body-minds from systems of oppression. To support this work as an educator-scholar, Shayda applies disability justice and collaborative care practices in the spaces she cultivates. Shayda’s writing and speaking presentations focus on intersectional body politics, particularly on how bodies are constructed and how they hold the capacity for rebellion. She is the author of Crip Kinship: The Disability Justice and Art Activism of Sins Invalid (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2021).
Pamela Aiko
Pamela Aiko (“Love Child”) Inaba has been an active Client/Consumer for 36 years & a premier Advocate/Activist/Organizer in LA, California, and nationally for over 40 years. With her Bachelor’s Degree in Recreation Therapy, Pam has worked in the helping professions. Through her activism, mentoring, and lived experience, she has taught Leadership, Social Development, Crisis Management, and other Life Skills. She has been an LA County ACCESS Ambassador at Cal Voices, managed the Los Angeles County Client Coalition, Inc., and worked in many various county and statewide committees where she has helped incorporate client/consumer voice and choice in the community planning process, established and strengthened empowerment and collaboration through individual and community engagement and inclusion, and combated stigma within the Asian American/Pacific Islander, LGBTQ+, and Physical Disabilities and other cultural communities. Pam offers ways to heal through recovery, engagement, empowerment, and growth and encourages the importance of play, hobbies, laughter, and fun with the “Move It or Lose it” philosophy & why integrating these concepts into your life can help create resiliency, holistic healing, and healthy living.
Tristan Scremin
Tristan Scremin co-founded Painted Brain, a mental health tech nonprofit in Los Angeles that provides peer-based services and practice training in technology and clinical mental health. She is also an independent consultant, including capacity building support and grant writing for small nonprofits serving communities of color. Her most recent accomplishments include organizing a National Network for Psychiatric Advance Directives and being featured in the Los Angeles Times for her work in the peer mental health sphere. She has dedicated her personal and professional pursuits to designing and advocating for comprehensive health and human service programs that enhance the human condition of the most vulnerable populations.
Orlando Vera
Orlando Vera is the CEO of Peer Voices of Orange County, and co-presenter with Pamela Inaba for the Advocacy 101 workshop.