The Board
The Alliance for Citizen Directed Supports was incorporated by:
Caitlin Bailey, Board Secretary, cait.bailey777@gmail.com
Caitlin Bailey, MS, PhD ABD, is the Director of Research and Evaluation at the National Leadership Consortium on Developmental Disabilities in the Department of Human Development and Family Science at the University of Delaware. The work of National Leadership Consortium supports the next generation of leaders to have the skills, knowledge and values needed to transform services and systems to ensure that people with disabilities direct their supports and lives.
Through her work, Caitlin has learned that what we measure is an important indicator of how we think about people with intellectual and developmental disabilities; her work primarily focuses on collaborative research in leadership, organizational sustainability, best practices in services and supports and policy decision-making processes in the disabilities sector. In her role, Caitlin has the opportunity to design, conduct and analyze research and evaluations that are led by people who are most affected by their outcomes: people with disabilities, their families and the people who work for them. She is committed to research that is meaningful and useful to helping agencies and states truly listen to the people they support to make organizational decisions and changes that will ultimately enhance the human rights of all people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Caitlin is a proud member of the Board of Directors for the National Alliance for Direct Support Professionals, the national organization committed to elevating the status of direct support professionals by improving practice standards, promoting system reform, and advancing their knowledge, skills and values. Caitlin is also honored to be a founder of the Alliance for Citizen Directed Supports.
“More and more, through our research and conversations with people with disabilities, direct support professionals and emerging leaders in this field, we’ve been hearing that people are ready for something different, something better. In order to advocate for the rights and citizenship of all people, we have to learn from and celebrate those who refuse to stand for anything less than inclusion and equal rights for all people. I am so honored to be a part of the Alliance for Citizen Directed Supports as we offer a home for those committed to improving services and supports for people with disabilities to share ideas, innovations, strategies and lessons learned to continue to build communities that value disability and the rights and dignity of all its members.”
Marian Frattarola-Saulino, Board Chair, marians@viapa.org
Honored to be elected as the first Board Chair of the Alliance for Citizen Directed Supports, Marian Frattarola-Saulino works to support the rights of all people, promoting inclusion, and coproducing sustainable support systems alongside people with disabilities, their families and allies.
She has worked in direct support of people as well as a group home supervisor, service director, supports broker and executive director. These experiences have enabled her to collaborate with, and learn from people with disabilities and their families, and to apply those lessons across teams, organizations and systems.
Marian serves as CEO of Values Into Action, a growing network of organizations she created with her husband, Paul Saulino in 2005. The organizations offer supports and services to people exclusively in their own homes and communities, and partner with people, their families and other chosen allies to design, deliver and evaluate services. A leader in participant/self-directed system, Marian leads efforts to expand the scale and scope of services led by people themselves, with the support they identify and define.
Marian currently serves as the Board Chair of the Collaborative for Citizen Directed Supports-New Jersey, a cause-based membership association, that like the Alliance, is dedicated to upholding the principles of self-agency and determination.
Marian holds a MSW from Temple University, with a specialization in social administration and planning.
“Nothing is more important to me than leaving the world a bit better than I have found it, especially for our three daughters. My contribution to this change is to work alongside allies, colleagues and friends to make it a more just and inclusive world, where all of us are acknowledged and welcomed for who we are and what we bring. The Alliance provides a forum for those of us impatient with the pace and direction of change in the disability services community, to challenge and disrupt, and ultimately change the way in which people’s rights are honored and upheld.”
Gail Godwin, Board Vice Chair, gail@sharedsupportmd.org
Executive Director, Shared Support Maryland, Inc.
Gail Godwin is the Executive Director of Shared Support Maryland, Inc. Gail’s MA is from the University of Pittsburgh, School of Education, Program in Severe Disabilities – educational, employment & community inclusion. For over 25 years, she has been an advocate in collaboration with people with disabilities & has worked in service provision organizations at a direct support staff, middle manager, administrator, and in training & development. Gail is a Founder and Officer of the Alliance of Citizen Directed Supports. She served 10 years (ended June 17) as a Board Member of The Maryland Association of Community Services, a graduate and faculty member of the Leadership Institute Consortium on Developmental Disabilities. Gail formerly served 10 years on Maryland’s Developmental Disabilities Council as an Executive Member. She is the co-founder of the New York Downstate Person Centered Consortium. Gail’s extensive experience is in Self Directed Service Provision, Positive Supports, Person Directed Planning & Individualized Supports Organizational Development
“It feels like a natural move for me personally and professionally. Of course I’m drawn to groups, communities and causes… where everyone belongs ~ where there exists no question as to the validity of someone and their place in the world. it’s that simple ~ the work for the cause and this movement is not that simple ~ that draws me to this work equally.”
Nancy Weiss, Board Treasurer, nancyrobinweiss@gmail.com
Director of Disability Initiatives, College of Health Sciences
Director, National Leadership Consortium on Developmental Disabilities University of Delaware
Nancy Weiss is the Director of Disability Initiatives and a member of the faculty of the College of Health Sciences at the University of Delaware. She directs the University’s Interdisciplinary Master’s Program in Leadership in Disability Services. She is also the Director of the National Leadership Consortium on Developmental Disabilities at the University of Delaware. The National Leadership Consortium is a partnership of fifteen national disability organizations focused on assuring the quality and commitment of the next generation of leaders for government and nonprofit organizations serving people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Ms. Weiss has more than 40 years of experience in the field of intellectual and developmental disabilities. She has worked extensively providing advocacy, community living and positive behavioral supports. She was the former Executive Director of TASH, an international advocacy association committed to the full inclusion of people with disabilities. Ms. Weiss has been an adjunct faculty member at Johns Hopkins University and the Director of the Department for Community Services at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore. She also served as the Executive Director of Community Systems, Inc. an agency providing progressive supports for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Ms. Weiss has worked relentlessly to end the use of aversive procedures since publishing a groundbreaking Amnesty International Call to Action in 1993. Over the ensuing twenty-four years she has organized advocates and spearheaded efforts to eliminate the use of pain and coercion as methods of behavioral control through efforts with the American Psychological Association, Human Rights Watch, Physicians for Human Rights, the U.S. Department of Justice and the Food and Drug Administration. She is the recipient of the 2007 Presidential Award of the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities “for career-long commitment to lives of independence, satisfaction and meaning for people with disabilities; exemplary leadership, and unflinching advocacy”, the 2015 American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Dybwad Humanitarian Award and the 2015 TASH Positive Behavior Support Award.
The consistent theme of Ms. Weiss’s work has been the promotion of disability supports and policies that assure communities, schools, and workplaces that include, value, engage and challenge people with disabilities and that guarantee that individuals with disabilities are treated humanely and have access to the full range of opportunities available to all citizens.
“I have been thinking about the need for a new association like The Alliance for Citizen Directed Supports for some time. In my work through the National Leadership Consortium on Developmental Disabilities I have realized that there is no organizational home for people committed to self-directed lives and the shift from congregate services (those provided to people with disabilities in group homes, day programs and sheltered workshops) to those offering real, full, meaningful lives that respond to the wants and needs of each person. I am saddened by how little supports for people with disabilities have changed since I began to work in this field in the 70s. I like the idea of an organization that has as members people with disabilities, family members and people who work in the field united behind a common vision. I look forward to The Alliance serving as a catalyst toward making quality lives and meaningful community inclusion a reality for all.”
These officers are joined by the additional members of the Founding Board of Directors:
Julia Bascom, jbascom@autisticadvocacy.org
Julia Bascom serves as Executive Director at the Autistic Self Advocacy Network. Previously, she did state-level work in her home state of New Hampshire, where she served on the DD council and co-led an inter-agency team to revitalize self-advocacy within the state, in addition to her work with ASAN. Julia edited Loud Hands: Autistic People, Speaking, an anthology of writings by autistic people, and currently serves on the Disability Equality Index advisory board, the Centene National Disability Advisory Council, and the boards of Felicity House and Advance CLASS, Inc. As an advocate for dignity, inclusion, and self-determination; as a self-advocate; and as a person who relies on long-term supports in her own life, Julia is thrilled to be a part of the Alliance.
Lydia Brown, lydia@autistichoya.com
Lydia X. Z. Brown is an advocate, organizer, activist, writer, educator, and speaker whose work has largely focused on violence against multiply-marginalized disabled people, especially institutionalization, incarceration, and policing. Lydia comes to the founding board of the Alliance for Citizen-Directed Services with nearly a decade of experience as a leader, thinker, and change-agent within the autistic self-advocacy and neurodiversity movements. They have worked to advance transformative change through organizing in the streets, writing legislation, conducting anti-ableism workshops, testifying at regulatory and policy hearings, and disrupting institutional complacency everywhere from the academy to state agencies and the nonprofit-industrial complex.
At present, Lydia serves as Chairperson of the Massachusetts Developmental Disabilities Council, stakeholder representative from TASH New England to the Massachusetts One Care Implementation Council overseeing health care for Medicaid/Medicare dually-eligible individuals, and board member of the Autism Women’s Network. In collaboration with E. Ashkenazy and Morénike Giwa-Onaiwu, Lydia is the lead editor and visionary behind All the Weight of Our Dreams, the first-ever anthology of writings and artwork by autistic people of color, published by the Autism Women’s Network in June 2017. Most recently, Lydia has designed and teaches a course on critical disability theory, public policy, and intersectional social movements as a Visiting Lecturer at Tufts University’s Experimental College, which they taught for the first time in 2016.
Lydia is a past Holley Law Fellow at the National LGBTQ Task Force, where they focused on reproductive justice and disability rights policy issues, and past Patricia Morrissey Disability Policy Fellow at the Institute for Educational Leadership, where they focused on employment opportunities for people with significant disabilities. Lydia also worked for the Autistic Self Advocacy Network for several years as part of the national public policy team, where Lydia worked on various issues relating to criminal justice and disability, healthcare disparities and service delivery models, and research and employment disparities. Additionally, Lydia has interned for the ACLU National Disability Rights Program, the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, the Movement Advancement Project, and the Disability Law Center of Massachusetts.
Lydia has been honored by the White House, the Washington Peace Center, the National Council on Independent Living, and the Disability Policy Consortium of Massachusetts. In 2015, Pacific Standard named Lydia a Top 30 Thinker under 30, and Mic named Lydia to its inaugural list of 50 impactful leaders, cultural influencers, and breakthrough innovators. Their work has been featured in various places, including Religion, Disability, and Interpersonal Violence, Barriers & Belonging: Personal Narratives of Disability, The Asian American Literary Review, Feminist Perspectives on Orange is the New Black, Criptiques, Torture in Healthcare Settings, QDA: A Queer Disability Anthology, Films for the Feminist Classroom, Tikkun, Disability Intersections, Black Girl Dangerous, hardboiled magazine, POOR Magazine, The Washington Post; Sojourners, The Establishment, Al Jazeera America, NBC News Asian America, HerCampus, AfterEllen, and Vice Broadly. Lydia is now a Public Interest Law Scholar at Northeastern University School of Law, where they co-founded the Disability Justice Caucus.
Larissa Clause, larissaclause@neighbours-inc.com
Kelly Bohlander Friedlander, kelly@cb-cg.com
Kelly Friedlander is a Partner and Co-Founder of Commu
nity Bridges Consulting Group. Kelly consults primarily on stakeholder engagement, advocacy, and developing innovative solutions to meet systems changes. Kelly also oversees the business development and outreach at Community Bridges.
A results-oriented, creative, and dedicated intellectual and developmental disability professional, Kelly has 10+ years of progressive responsibility in advocacy, policy analysis, and program development/administration. She excels at facilitating outreach and cross-agency collaboration that empower people with developmental disabilities and family members to be advocates and leaders. A strategic problem-solver, she has the ability to work across all levels of an organization and uncover ways to become more person-centered, reduce unnecessary staff activity and expense, and produce better outcomes for the organization and individuals served. Kelly has a proven track record supporting people with intellectual and developmental disabilities to live valued lives of their own design.
Prior to co-founding Community Bridges, Kelly was the founder and principal of Catalyst Consulting, where she worked on stakeholder engagement and policy analysis projects forclients such as the National Association of State Directors of Developmental Disabilities Services, RHA Howell, the National Association of Councils on Developmental Disabilities, and Anthem Healthcare. Prior to this role, Kelly served as the Director of Systems Change Management at the North Carolina Council on Developmental Disabilities where she oversaw the strategic planning and program implementation of $1.5 million of Council-funded initiatives annually. Before moving to North Carolina, Kelly served as the Operational Manager of Pyramid, Inc., the largest day training program in Florida. She also has experience working within a state government, as she provided oversight to the Developmental Services Quality Assurance Contract at Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration.
Kelly holds a Masters of Social Work, a Masters of Public Administration, and a Bachelors of Social Work. In addition, she is a graduate from the National Leadership Consortium on Developmental Disabilities Leadership Institute. In addition to being on the Board of ACDS, Kelly is a Board Member and Public Policy Chair for the National Alliance for Direct Support Professionals.
Angela Martin, angela.martin@wayne.edu
Angela Martin is the Associate Director for Community Supports and Services at the Michigan Developmental Disabilities Institute (Michigan’s University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities) at Wayne State University. Angela has a Master’s degree in Social Work with a concentration in Community Practice and Social Action. She has experience in resource development, curriculum design, and training of programs on Self-Determination, Person Centered Planning, Family Support and Leadership/Self-Advocacy. Angela’s youngest sibling, who was born with intellectual and development disabilities, has laid a strong foundation in her life’s work particularly as it relates to Self-Determination.
Angela is passionate about supporting individuals with disabilities to self-direct their supports and live, work, participate and contribute to their community. She is a founding member of Michigan Partners for Freedom, a grassroots coalition of individuals with disabilities, family members, advocates, and providers with the mission to build statewide demand for Self-Determination. Angela is actively supporting Self-Advocates of Michigan (SAM), the statewide network of self-advocates with developmental disabilities. Angela is a founding member of the Sibling Leadership Network (SLN) and the Michigan Supporting and Including Brothers and Sisters (MI-SIBS), the SLN Michigan State Chapter.
Amanda Rich, arich1@ycp.edu
Amanda Rich is currently a professor and the program coordinator of Human Services at York College of Pennsylvania where she teaches course work related to direct practice, administration and public policy impacting human service organizations. Her work is rooted in the belief that human services have the potential to help make our communities more inclusive, diverse, fairer and stronger. She has a master’s degree in Applied Behavior Analysis and Special Education from the Teacher’s College at Columbia University and a doctoral degree in Human Development and Family Studies from the University of Delaware. Amanda got introduced to the field of human services and disability supports through her families’ advocacy with and for her uncle, who has developmental disabilities. She formally began her career in therapeutic recreation and has worked as a direct support professional, personal care attendant, program manager and special education teacher. Currently her professional work focuses on the structural challenges faced by marginalized families, strategies they use to fight for change, community-based and citizen directed support services, trauma informed support systems and the development of the human service workforce. Amanda recently has published a book entitled Standing Together and Finding a Voice Apart: Advocating for Intellectual Disability Rights.
“I am honored to be a part of the development of the Alliance for Citizen Directed Supports. I believe that support services have the potential, not only to help people live freer and valued lives of their choosing, but also to help shape the way our communities understand diversity, interdependence, and disability for the better. I think this can only happen when services are delivered in a way that truly respects that people have the right and empowers people to exert meaningful choice and control in their lives and build freely given human relationships. What these services look like, how they can be improved and how they can be brought to scale, must be ongoing discussions of people committed to this work. I believe the Alliance for Citizen Directed Supports is the vehicle to move these discussions and this work forward.”
Michael Steinbruck, steinbmp@rwjms.rutgers.edu
Michael Steinbruck, MA is the Program Coordinator at The Boggs Center on Developmental Disabilities. Mr. Steinbruck’s programmatic focus is on developing the Person Centered Approaches in Schools and Transition (PCAST) project. He leads the project’s training and technical assistance activities related to the development and delivery of person centered thinking and planning, and works with schools on implementation of person centered approaches and related organizational improvement efforts.
Mr. Steinbruck has more than 20 years’ experience in facilitation and training various person centered thinking and planning approaches and is a Mentor Trainer in person centered thinking and planning as certified by The Learning Community for Person Centered Practices, Inc.
Mr. Steinbruck previously served for 12 years as the Boggs Center’s Program Administrator. During that time, he managed the Center’s Self-Directed Supports Project and delivered training and technical assistance on self-directed supports, organization and systems change, and person centered thinking and planning. Prior to coming to the Boggs Center in 2001, Mr. Steinbruck worked in support of people with disabilities in the roles of direct support professional, residential manager, trainer, quality improvement specialist, and director of community residential services.
Mr. Steinbruck has served on the Board of Directors of The Learning Community for Person Centered Practices since 2006 and has held the office of Vice-Chair since 2010. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Rutgers College and a Master of Arts degree from New York University.
Mr. Steinbruck is extremely active in the New Brunswick and Franklin Township (Somerset) communities in efforts to build inclusive communities and promote food justice. Mr. Steinbruck frequently uses the arts as a vehicle to promote these issues. He serves on the Elijah’s Promise Board of Advisors, the Franklin Township Food Bank Board of Trustees, and is Chair of the Franklin Township Cultural Arts Council, which he co-founded. He founded the Hub City Music Festival which he runs in partnership with the New Brunswick Cultural Center to benefit Elijah’s Promise, and co-founded and co-chairs the Delaware and Raritan Canal Festival, which benefits the Franklin Township Food Bank.
“It is an honor to work in support of any effort whose purpose it is to ensure the ability and opportunity of all people to direct their own supports. It grows more critical each day to innovate, share learning and advocate for self-direction worldwide. Demand for direct support is exploding and pressure from our systems to meet that demand without ensuring the adherence to person centered practice is a constant reality. It is an increasing threat to people living lives that they themselves plan for and control. I support The Alliance because the Alliance supports the struggle of people with disabilities and families in the disability rights movement to keep the disability industry in check.”