Speakers

Featured Speakers include some of the leading individuals in the field of developmental disabilities both in California and North America

Dion Aroner

Assemblywoman Dion Aroner is Chair of the Assembly Human Services Committee, author of the Developmental Disabilities System Unification legislation, AB896, and a past President of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 535 of California. Ms. Aroner also served as Chief of Staff to Assemblyman Tom Bates, preparing over 100 pieces of legislation, including bills on childcare, disability rights, children’s mental health, educational finance and family policy.

Cliff Allenby

Clifford Allenby is Director of the California Department of Developmental Services (DDS). Prior to this appointment he served as interim Director of the Department of General Services, Secretary of Health and Welfare Agency, Deputy Director of the State Department of Finance, Chief Legislative Representative for Los Angeles County, and Senior Staff Vice-President for Governmental Affairs for the California Building Industry Association.

Hank Bersani

Hank Bersani is Associate Professor and Chair of the Division of Special Education at Western Oregon University and Research Assistant Professor at Oregon Health Sciences University. He has consulted to organizations and governments nationally and internationally. His current focus is on the role of assistive technology and self‑determination in changing the nature of services to people with severe disabilities, and research on health risks to people with developmental disabilities of substance abuse and cancer.

David Braddock

David Braddock is Associate Vice President for Research and Executive Director of the Coleman Institute for Cognitive Disabilies and Coleman-Turner Professor of Cognitive Disability and Psychiatry at the University of Colorado System. He is Past President of the American Association on Mental Retardation (AAMR) and Editor of AAMR’s Monograph series. He is formerly Director of the Department of Disability and Human Development at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He is well-known for his annual The State of the States in Developmental Disabilities research reports that track state trends in services and spending.

Terry Boisot

Terry Boisot’s advocacy to build a community that would welcome her son Ben led her to found the education focused parent/professional coalition “Collaborating for Integration,” and “Brick by Brick” dedicated to remove attitudinal, architectural, social and communication barriers. Ms. Boisot serves on the Boards of The Arc of the United States, TheArcLink, Alpha Resource Center of Santa Barbara, and the California Alliance for Inclusive Communities. She is the author of the widely acclaimed weekly column Disability Matters.

Mary Cerreto

Mary Cerreto has worked for 25 years in the field of developmental disabilities, early intervention, quality assurance and accreditation, and pediatric and primary care psychology. She was Assistant Commissioner, Office of Quality Enhancement for the Massachusetts Department of Mental Retardation, has presented at numerous national conferences, written extensively, and has been on the Editorial Board for many professional journals. She is currently faculty in the Department of Family Medicine at Boston University and an independent consultant to several state governments.

Bill Coffelt

Bill Coffelt is Co-Chair (Parent Representative) National Coalition on Self-Determination. Mr. Coffelt is the father of Bill Jr., a 23-year old man with significant developmental disabilities who has lived in a state institution and currently lives in his own home with 24-hour support. He is co-founder of the Oaks Group, which advocates for community options, and was lead plaintiff in the largest deinstitutionalization lawsuit of its kind, resulting in the reduction of the population of California's state institutions by over 2,000 individuals. Mr. Coffelt's recent activities include participation in the National Coalition on Self-Determination and promotion of the Community Imperative.

June Downing

June Downing is a Professor at California State University, Northridge. For the past 17 years she has been a teacher-trainer in the areas of Moderate/Severe Disabilities, Severe/Multiple Impairments, and Visual Impairments at universities in Kansas, Arizona and California. Her research and writing is concentrated on students with severe and multiple disabilities in inclusive settings. Ms. Downing is a lifetime member of TASH and an executive board member.

Mary Falvey

Mary Falvey is a former member of the TASH Board of Directors and has been an active Cal-TASH member since its inception. She is a Professor at California State University, Los Angeles and is an advocate for children with disabilities in inclusive schools.

Thomas Gilhool

Thomas Gilhool is a Staff Attorney at the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia (PILCOP). He previously served as Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. He has been the lead attorney in precedent setting law suits on behalf of people with disabilities, including the ground-breaking right-to-education PARC case. Mr. Gilhool currently serves as counsel for the plaintiffs in the Sanchez v. Johnson case in California.

Ellen Goldblatt

Ellen Goldblatt has been a senior attorney with California Protection & Advocacy, Inc. (PAI) since 1985 working as both a policy and legal advocate. She was lead counsel on the class-action lawsuit Coffelt v. DDS, which resulted in the movement of over 2, 000 people from California’s institutions and substantial improvements to the community service system. She was counsel for interveners in the federal case Richard S. v. DDS v. Bell

Ann Halvorsen

Ann Halvorsen is a Professor of Special Education at California State University at Hayward. She is Director of Project CLEAR, Coaching Leadership Education and Restructuring for Inclusive Schools, and has directed a series of statewide and district focused projects over the past 12 years aimed at inclusive systems change at both state and local levels.

Scott Klassen

Scott Klassen is Co-President of the Association for Community Living in Winnipeg, Canada, a member of the News Team at Radio Q-94 FM, and a founder of the Winnipeg Self-Advocacy Association. He is a frequent presenter at disability conferences and performs regularly with a Celtic band. He lived in an institution for the first 21 years of his life.

K. Charlie Lakin

Charlie Lakin is Director of Research and Training Center on Community Living and a Research Fellow at the Institute on Community Integration at the University of Minnesota. He is the author of over 100 books, articles, and chapters on community living and residential services and a frequent consultant to federal and state agencies. He has been a member of the President’s Committee on Mental Retardation and is a past recipient of AAMR’s Dybwad Humanitarian Award.

Patricia McGill Smith

Patricia McGill Smith has been one of the nation’s foremost leaders of the parent movement over the past three decades. She founded Pilot Parents in Nebraska in the early 1970s and was the founder of the National Parent Network on Disability. She previously served as Acting Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services.

Pat Mejia

Patricia Mejia is a parent of a daughter, Nina, who is fifteen years old and has multiple disabilities. She has worked at the Family Resource Center in San Francisco, Support for Families of Children with Disabilities for the past seven years. She is also a member of the Board of Directors for Family Voices, a grassroots organization speaking on behalf of children with special health care needs. Ms. Mejia’s areas of interest are education, deafness, and multi-cultural issues.

Hector Mendez

Hector Mendez, is the Executive Director of La Familia Counseling Service in Hayward, California serving primarily the Hispanic/Latino community with special emphasis on families of persons with developmental and psychiatric disabilities. Originally from Chile, Mr. Mendez has been a consistent advocacy and organizing leader for the Latino population. Through his long standing commitment to the national parent organization Fiesta Educativa, he lectures and provides training and consultation to Family Support Groups, governmental agencies, and advocacy organizations.

David Miller

David Miller is President of Capitol People First and is a graduate of Community College. He organizes and facilities a self-advocacy group at Easter Seals; and has worked hard to educate area high school students about advocacy, rights, and dreams. Mr. Miller resided in several nursing facilities until the staff of Resources for Independent Living asked if he had ever thought about living in a place of his own. It was the question that set him free.

Pat Napoliello

Pat Napoliello is the mother of four children, including Joseph who has severe developmental disabilities. Ms. Napoliello is President of Arc California, a Board Member of C.A.I.C., and immediate past President of the Arc San Francisco. She has worked extensively with the San Francisco Unified School District, the Community Alliance for Special Education, Support for Families with Children with Disabilities, and The Arc of the United States.

Tom Neary has been working in Special Education since 1972. This included work on a variety of federal grants on school inclusion and behavioral support. He has been a special education teacher, educational specialist for SERN, Coordinator of special education for Colusa County SELPA, Program Specialist for Sacramento County SELPA, and has been a part-time faculty member at California State University Sacramento for about 17 years.

John O’Brien and Connie Lyle O’Brien are founders of Responsive Systems Associations. They have been pioneers in the development of person-centered planning and strategies for community building. They are frequent consultants and workshop facilitators for public and private agencies in North America, Europe, Australia, and other countries.

Mark Polit has been a parent advocate for over twenty years for inclusive education and inclusive communities in California. He is President of the California Alliance for Inclusive Communities (C.A.I.C.), past President of the Alameda County Developmental Disabilities Council, and formerly Vice President of the Oaks Group.

Ruth Shelton joined Capitol People First over fifteen years ago and has worked hard to educate people about their rights and opportunities. When she was ten years old, she was sent to live at the Sonoma State Home and for several decades resided in institutions and other segregated living facilities. She now lives in her own home and is a talented artist.

Bonnie Shoultz is Associate Director at the Center on Human Policy at Syracuse University. Since the 1970s, she has actively supported the development of self-advocacy groups and has served as an advisor to state and local groups as well as the national group of Self Advocates Becoming Empowered.

Jim Shorter is Executive Director of Tri-Counties Regional Center serving Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo Counties. He earned his J.D. degree at Northeastern University School of Law. He has held leadership positions in the field of developmental disabilities for over twenty-five years, including Executive Director of the California State Council on Developmental Disabilities, Area Board VI, and North LA County Regional Center,

Jeff Strully is a parent and the Executive Director of Jay Nolan Community Services of Los Angeles. He has transformed it from a traditional human services agency to one that supports people with autism and other challenging behaviors to live in their own homes, work in paid integrated employment, and be fully included in all aspects of life. He and his wife have been pioneers and leaders of the inclusion movement in the United States since 1980, through writings, lectures and their example. He is currently an Associate of the G. Allan Roeher Institute and an Associate of the Centre for Inclusion and Community Education, both in Canada.

Steven Taylor is Director of the Center on Human Policy, Professor of Education, and Coordinator of Disability Studies at Syracuse University. He was one of the original framers of the Community Imperative declaration and has worked closely with self-advocates, family members, and attorneys to expand community services and supports for people with disabilities in New York State and nationally. Mr. Taylor is the Editor of AAMR’s journal Mental Retardation and is a past recipient of AAMR’s Research Award.

Cheryl Marie Wade is a disability activist-artist and an award-winning writer-performer. She has performed her unique poetic brand of solo theater at such venues as the Southern Theater in Minneapolis and the Mark Taper Forum’s New Works festival in Los Angeles. She was the first director of Wry Crips Disabled Women’s Theater Group, a founder member of Axis Dance Company, and co-producer of Disability Culture Rap. Online she produces GnarlyBone News.