York Hills and Southlake Health partner to strengthen mental health support for Black communities in York Region and southern Simcoe County

York Hills Centre for Children, Youth, and Families and Southlake Health announced a new partnership aimed at strengthening mental health outcomes for Black communities across York Region and southern Simcoe County. The collaboration will expand the Kuumba program, adding a new crisis worker to support Black-identifying children, youth, and families and deliver culturally responsive services. 

Launched in 2020 by York Hills, the Kuumba program is a culturally grounded therapeutic service designed specifically to support Black-identifying children, youth, and families. Kuumba, a Swahili word meaning “creativity,” reflects the power of imagination, resilience, and cultural expression in fostering healing and well-being. Rooted in Afrocentric principles and guided by anti-oppressive and anti-Black racism-informed practices, the Kuumba program provides mental health services that affirm identity, build coping strategies, strengthens cultural pride, and fosters resilience. 

York Hills and Southlake’s partnership expands the Kuumba Program to include dedicated mental health crisis support through a new crisis worker at Southlake Health. The crisis worker is a trained mental health professional from the Black community who specializes in care for Black-identifying children and youth to enhance access to culturally safe, trauma-informed crisis care, both within the hospital and in collaboration with community service partners. 

Black-identifying youth who present at Southlake’s Emergency Department and require crisis support will be connected with the crisis worker. The crisis worker helps to support a culturally affirming space and ensures their care experience is respectful, compassionate, and grounded in understanding. The crisis worker also strengthens partnerships with regional agencies to improve coordination and increase access to mobile crisis support throughout the community. 

Patient testimonial:  

“My son was in crisis and was admitted to Southlake Health. During this time, he was connected with Shannon from the Kuumba program.   

My family was relieved to know that Southlake had support for Black youth in the community. Her approach helped my son in many ways but notably seeing someone from his community shaped how open he was to getting help. Knowing this support is at Southlake for him and other youth in crisis is so important. Moving from a diverse area to Newmarket, I was worried care responders would not understand community and cultural differences, but the additional support from York Hills and NACCA made us feel as if there is an entire community around us to help us through this difficult time.

I am very thankful Shannon was there to walk us through everything and advocate for my son. He is doing better and using the tools that he was provided via the services Shannon put in place.”