The flip side of “where is my child going to live?” is “where will he work?”

Cary Griffin of Griffin-Hammis Associates dared us to get outside the box in thinking about this. Of course, focusing on developmental disabilities and those with severe mental disabilities, the traditional places of employment are sheltered workshops and specific jobs in the community, like janitorial work or bagging groceries. Those jobs have two basic problems. The first is that they are usually below poverty wages. The second is... more

Every time I come back from my Partners in Policymaking class, I have more to share about disability issues and some of the cutting-edge ideas in the needs and care of our largest minority: people with disabilities.

This month our topics were housing and employment. Quite frankly, since LuLu is only 11, I haven’t given that much thought to either of these topics. I can’t see a clear course for her future, so in some ways, I avoid looking ahead. But there are a few things I do know. One, she’ll need to live somewhere and that somewhere will eventually not be... more