A free online event this week aims to educate and prompt dialogue around the rights of people with disabilities and the movement away from isolated institutions toward more home and community-based services.
“Transforming Community Living” will be hosted by the Western Pennsylvania Disability History and Action Consortium, a group that works to preserve and share local disability history.
There will be two short film screenings: “From Wrongs to Rights,” which depicts the beginning of the deinstitutionalization movement in Western Pennsylvania, and “Polk Center 1897-2023: A Reflection.” Polk Center, in Venango County, was a state-run institution for people with disabilities that closed earlier this year after operating for more than a century. It had been the oldest such institution operating in the state.
The event was prompted by Polk’s recent closure, said Nancy Murray, an executive committee member of the Western Pennsylvania Disability History and Action Consortium.
“What we wanted to do was sort of bridge the past and the future,” she said.
There will also be an address by Jill Jacobs, Commissioner for the U.S. Administration on Disabilities for the Administration for Community Living, part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Following that will be a panel discussion on shaping the future of home and community-based services moderated by disability rights leader Chaz Kellem. Panelists include Kristin Ahrens, deputy secretary of Pennsylvania’s Office of Developmental Programs in the Department of Human Services; Hope Dittmeier, executive director of Mattingly Edge; and Christopher Liuzzo, independent consultant.
“We're leaving the whole idea that people with disabilities need to live in institutions, we're leaving that all in the past,” Murray said. “And we want people to really focus on what's available to people now in the community, but also [what] some of the challenges still are,” such as low wages for direct care workers who work with people with disabilities.
The event will take place Thursday, Oct. 26. More information, or registration, is here.
