Event
Topeka Outdoors
I hope you find as much inspiration exploring these events as I did being part of them, each one a step toward creating lasting impact. Hope to see you at the next one.
Wednesday, September 16, 2026, 12:00 PM | Room 143B, Walter E. Washington Convention Center, Washington, DC
Dr. Topeka K. Sam joins the panel "Reimagining Public Safety: The Future of Criminal Justice and the Role of Mental Health and Addiction Services" at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation's 55th Annual Legislative Conference. This year's conference theme is Rooted, Ready, and Rising.
The member session is hosted by Congressman Wesley Bell of Missouri's First District.
What the panel covers
Black Americans are disproportionately affected both by the criminal legal system and by barriers to mental health and addiction care. The session centers Black experts on how diversion policies, which route people toward treatment instead of incarceration, can work as an intervention point: lowering recidivism, addressing root causes, and producing fairer outcomes for individuals, families, and communities when they are designed through a racial equity lens.
Featured panelists
- Dr. Shawanna Vaughn, Founder of Silent Cry Inc.
- Dr. Luke Wood, President of Sacramento State
- Dr. Kendra Holmes, PharmD, President and CEO of Affinia Healthcare
- Dr. Topeka K. Sam, Founder of The Ladies of Hope Ministries, Inc.
Why Dr. Sam is in this room
Diversion is the question she has worked on from both sides. She has lived the sentence, and she has spent the years since building what should have existed instead: housing, healthcare access, and living-wage work for women coming home. That work runs through The Ladies of Hope Ministries and through EPIC Health, the public benefit corporation she co-founded to make care reach communities the system routinely misses.
Attend the session
Register for the 55th Annual Legislative Conference.
Book Dr. Topeka K. Sam to speak
Dr. Sam speaks on justice reform, reentry, women's leadership, health equity, and economic empowerment for audiences nationwide. Request a speaking engagement or explore her speaking topics and experience.
