Community Empowerment Through Holistic Wellness is a community-shaped project, led by the Health Association of African Canadians (HAAC) and funded by Health Canada, it is designed to strengthen wellness for African Nova Scotian communities and People of African Ancestry through culturally competent, relationship-based supports. Over the project period, HAAC will work alongside elders, youth, parents, families, and people with lived experience, community leaders, and frontline workers to support trauma healing, substance use prevention and harm reduction, youth mentorship, family care, and service navigation.

The project is grounded in collective wellbeing, community relationships, cultural identity, and strength-based approaches. It brings together Africentric and Indigenous-informed trauma frameworks to honor the realities of collective and intergenerational trauma while creating culturally safe pathways for healing, connection, and restoration.

What We Will Do Together

• Culturally competent and trauma-informed counselling: Individual and family sessions focused on trauma, grief, stress, substance use and addictions.
• Support groups and healing circles: Peer-led spaces for coping, grief, connection, and shared learning.
• Youth mentorship: Resilience-focused programming that supports young people in building confidence, belonging, and healthy pathways forward.
• Parent and caregiver education: Workshops and conversations on trauma, prevention, family support, and community-based care.
• Harm reduction and prevention: Culturally competent materials, dialogue, and supports that meet people where they are.
• Outreach and navigation: Warm referrals to mental health, addictions, and community supports, with community relationships as the anchor.

Ways to Get Involved

• Join a local Community Planning Committee: Help shape & run the project, guide priorities, and ensure the work reflects community realities and strengths.
• Become a service provider or partner:  Collaborate with HAAC to offer culturally competent supports that reflect African Nova Scotian communities and People of African Ancestry’s realities. For example, we are looking for registered counselling therapist, clinical social workers, psychologists, Africentric workshop facilitators, art therapists, wellness facilitators, gathering spaces and more.
• Become a peer facilitator or mentor: Share your experience, leadership, and care in community-based spaces where lived experience with grief, trauma, violence and or substance use is welcomed and valued.
• Attend a gathering: Take part in workshops, wellness opportunities, support groups, counselling and celebrations.
• Share your story: Lived experience and storytelling can help others heal, grow, and feel less alone.

Contact

To learn more or get involved, please contact Mélika Fontaine by email, melika@haac.ca or call 902-410-0847.