Justice Matters Convening 2025

“Breaking Barriers and Strengthening Our Response to Childhood Trauma Stakeholders Summit,” September 2025

Amber Sellers and the Justice Matters network convened as a response to a pressing concern those in Lawrence, Kansas are facing; childhood trauma.

Live drawing artifact from the event. — The live drawing by Sara O’Keeffe, from this event captured themes like prevention, protection, healing, accountability, disrupting the cycle, collaboration, and scaling impact within systems. This drawing included the river and boats motif to convey the idea of moving efforts upstream with the intention to reimagine and liberate systems to benefit everyone.

In early 2025, Amber Sellers, Lawrence City Commissioner, committed to gathering a group of stakeholders from Lawrence and Douglas County by September 2025. Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services, and Maternal and Child Behavioral Health Director with the Bureau of Family Health part of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, Department of Children and Families, Children’s Alliance, Douglas County CASA, Headquarter Kansas, Kansas Children’s Service League, Youth Recovery Center, and Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health amongst many others participated as stakeholders to explore proven solutions to address childhood trauma in Lawrence, Kansas.

This meeting provided valuable insight into what services are currently available, what partnerships and connections exist and need to be made and “prevent, protect, and heal” approaches to prioritize. They determined which stakeholders need to meet regularly to find the solution to be able to move towards implementation.

“We use the power of our collective voices to advocate where we see injustices in our community.”-Ann Spangler, Justice Matters Advocate