With over twenty-four years of creativity as a musician, filmmaker and sound-designer Paul Manly has dedicated his efforts to produce and support the production of work that educates, inspires and illuminates. Paul owns and operates a video production company, Manly Media www.manlymedia.com and has been working in the film and television industry in various capacities for eighteen years. Paul is also active with a number of environmental and social justice organizations and utilizes his media skills to support their activities.

Gordon Laxer is the Director and co-founder of Parkland Institute, a non-corporate, research network at the University of Alberta. He is a Political Economy professor who has published five books and 34 journal articles and book chapters. Laxer is a socially-engaged, public intellectual whose views appear frequently in the media. He was the first chairperson of the "Waffle" movement in Toronto in 1969, and in 1985, was the first head of the Edmonton chapter of the Council of Canadians. In the past three years, he has had had six op eds in the Globe and Mail, and interviewed four times on the CBC's the Current. On May 10, 2007 he shut down the Parliamentary Committee on International Trade's testimony on the Security and Prosperity Partnership. Leon Benoit, the Conservative Chair of the committee was so incensed by his invited testimony, he cut Laxer off after three minutes, stormed out of the meeting after his ruling was challenged by the majority of the committee's MPs. The brouhaha was front section news in the Ottawa Citizen, Montreal Gazette, and Edmonton Journal. Within a few days, the Calgary Herald and Edmonton Journal ran Laxer's suppressed testimony in full, and the Globe an op ed on the incident. Gordon is currently writing a book entitled Freezing in the Dark. Energy Security for Canadians, and is preparing for such an eventuality by cycling to work through Edmonton's winters.

Mordecai Briemberg was born and raised in Edmonton, eventually graduating with an honours degree in Political Science from the University of Alberta. As a recipient of the Rhodes Scholarship for Alberta, he went to Oxford (UK) and continued studies in political philosophy for two years. Transferring to the field of sociology, he continued post-graduate studies at the University of California, Berkeley. Returning to Canada in 1966 to teach at Simon Fraser University, he later was elected chair of the Political Science, Sociology and Anthropology (PSA) Department. He has worked for trade unions, independent newspapers, done popular education and taught English as a Second Language for 25 years at Douglas College in New Westminister.

For more than two decades Briemberg has been a radio broadcaster on the three-hour weekly public and cultural affairs program "Redeye", at Vancouver Cooperative Radio. He has been an anti-war activist for the last 45 years, in the anti-nuclear movement, the anti-Vietnam war movement, and currently organizes with Stopwar.ca against the Canadian government involvement in wars against the people of Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon and Palestine most particularly. Since 1967 he has campaigned actively for justice for the Palestinian people, now as a member of Canada Palestine Support Network (Canpalnet) and as a director on the board of the Near East Cultural and Educational Foundation. He is editor and contributor to the book "It Was, It Was Not: Essays and Art on the War Against Iraq".

The YWCA (Vancouver) honoured Briemberg for his anti-war and Palestine support work with the "International Peacemaker of the Year" award (2008). For this same work in support of the just rights of the Palestinian people, Canwest-Global media targeted him with a SLAPP--a strategic lawsuit against public participation. Although the charges were eventually dropped, an internationally supported Seriously Free Speech Committee (seriouslyfreespeech.ca) has been formed to defend the authors against this SLAPP suit, and to advocate across Canada for free expression, without censorship, harassment or criminalization, on matters related to Palestine/Israel.

* ESPA would also like to thank the International Palestine Awareness Committee for graciously coordinating the donation of Middle Eastern food to the Oct. 26 dinner just prior to Mordecai's presentation.

Chris Hay is the incoming Executive Director of the John Howard Society Provincial Office, which (among other things) is the research facility to support the other regional chapters.

Chris has a Policing Diploma from Grant MacEwan, a BA from the University of Alberta, and a MA from Carleton University. He has been involved in the justice system for past 18 years, in multiple areas including Probation (6 years), the John Howard Society (3 years), the Joint Task Force between policing and Children's Services (3 years), Children's Services in Hobemma (2 years), and as a Civilian member in charge of the Intelligence Unit of the Edmonton Police Service (5 years). Chris instructs a variety of Sociology, Criminology, Research Methods, and Policing courses at MacEwan University, Athabasca University, Norquest College, and the British Columbia Institute of Technology. He also instructs intelligence courses internationally for the International Association of Crime Analysts and for Crime and Justice Analysts. Last, Chris is the Tactical Advisor for the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service.

* ESPA also welcomes Anarchist Black Cross (Edmonton) for participating in the NoN Expo prison programming.

Doug Brady is the Executive Director, Edmonton Drug Treatment and Community Restoration Court (EDTCRC). He has over 30 years experience in Correctional Services working with adult and young offenders in both institutional and community settings. Since 1990, Doug has been employed as a Probation officer in both urban and rural settings. He has worked extensively with youth justice committees and the aboriginal community. Since1991, Doug has worked in such positions as Program Director for Yellowhead Tribal Community Corrections Society, Senior Probation officer position in St. Albert, and Assistant Chief Probation officer for the Edmonton Central Intake office. In August 2006, Doug was seconded to the Chief Probation Officer for the Stony Plain District. In May of 2007, Doug Brady accepted the position of Executive Director of the EDTCRC, and in September 2009, he was appointed the Interim National Director for the Canadian Association of Drug Treatment Court Professionals.

The EDTCRC began operations in December 2005 with funding from Justice Canada and Health Canada's Drug Strategy Program. The aim is to reduce the harm people cause to themselves and others through their drug use, and to reduce the risk that they will continue to use drugs and thereby come into conflict with the law. Participants must attend court weekly for 8 to 18 months and individually discuss with the drug treatment court Judge His or her progress in recovery. Each participant's recovery program is individual and monitored or assisted weekly through random and frequent urine screens, addiction treatment programs, assistance with housing, education, health and financial means.

Between 1988-1995 Sharlene practiced Law in the areas of Family, Criminal, and Dependent Adult Law. Since 1997 she has been a designer, developer and trainer of Conflict Resolution workshops, and since 2003 has been a Civil Mediator in Provincial Court. In 2006 Sharlene developed the Restorative Justice Certificate Program for Mediation & Restorative Justice Centre (MRJC), now offered in Edmonton and provincially. She also designed a Victim-Offender Restorative Dialogue Program for MRJC following the recommendations of Edmonton stakeholders (Crown Counsel, Defence Counsel, EPS, Victim Services, Community Corrections, Native Counselling, GMCC & U of A Criminology/Corrections Placement Officers, RJ Facilitators, and community organizations such as John Howard Society (program delivery started in June 2009). Since 2007 Sharlene has been a Sessional Instructor in Dispute Resolution at the U of A Faculty of Law.

Mandy is a representative of the National Farmers Union, and will participate on the panel specifically to address the issue of the possible closure of prison farms in Canada, and why the NFU views this as short-sighted. (More info available on Thursday.)

The Beehive Collective is an all-volunteer, art-activist workshop that has gained international attention and participation for its collaboratively produced graphics campaigns focused on globalization and militarization. Through collaborations with communities on the frontlines of globalization at home and abroad, the workerbees create collaborative, hand-illustrated posters of dizzying intricacy that result in patchwork "quilts" of personal narratives shared with them on their travels. Their copyleft graphics, which take years to produce, result in tools for broad popular analysis, education and organizing in an art-based, interactive format for anyone to use.

With banner reproductions of staggering size, the Bees use storytelling to take audiences on an exploration of their work to draw connections between colonial history and present day struggles against corporate globalization, violence, and racism. Their "picture lecture" presentations and workshops offer an accessible and interactive visual alternative for unpacking how resource extraction, militarization and industrial development are all part of the "big picture" of corporate globalization. With two giant illustrated portable murals (FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS and PLAN COLOMBIA), a six foot tall fabric storybook, and an engaging narrative, the Bees have awed and inspired audiences across the hemispheres. The 2009 version will also include previews of scenes from MESOAMERICA RESISTE, the final epic chapter in their trilogy about globalization in the Americas, the most ambitious and elaborate illustration to date... 5 YEARS in the making and nearly hatched.

Since 2000, the Bees have been making anti-copyright, political graphics meant to be used for education and organizing. They are working to develop a widely accessible, art-based communication strategy. Volunteer Bees give 'picture-lecture' presentations and workshops at approximately 150 locations internationally each year. Over the last six years the Bees have distributed more than 60,000 posters through entirely grassroots, by-hand distribution. The all volunteer Beehive has grown to include a core swarm of eleven Bees, plus autonomous worker Bees in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Colombia and Europe. More info at: http://www.beehivecollective.org.