AS:018 Advocacy that Leads to Change

Speaker 0:02

Welcome to the accessibility solutions podcast hosted by Linda hunt, an award winning accessibility consultant, speaker and author. With over 30 years experience in senior management roles and a deep passion for creating inclusive environments. Linda brings us unmatched expertise and credibility to our discussions join us as they explore transformative power of accessibility and inclusion in today's world. Through captivating conversations, Linda shares her wealth of knowledge provides practical solutions and sheds light on the latest trends and advancements in the field. Whether you're a business owner or disability advocate, or simply curious about the world of accessibility, this podcast is your go to resource. Get ready to unlock new perspectives, break down barriers and embark on a journey of empowerment. Are you ready to create a more inclusive world? Whoo, let's begin. Welcome to the accessibility solutions podcast.

Linda 1:02

Tracy Odell is President of Citizens With Disabilities - Ontario and 2nd Vice President of the Council of Canadians with Disabilities. Tracy has a Master's degree in Critical Disability Studies. This experience galvanized her desire to live in the community and make it possible for others to do the same. Tracy is credited with starting "nurturing assistance", which enables parents with disabilities to be involved loving and capable parents to their young children. Using nurturing assistance, Tracy raised two daughters with her husband while working full time and volunteering on boards and been boards to provide attendant services and raise awareness of issues relating to disability by myself. I've known Tracy for a number of years, and I am pleased to welcome Tracy to our summit to kick off our advocacy session. So Tracy, go ahead.

Tracy 1:57

Okay. Well, thank you very much for the invitation to do this. It's always a very busy week being access Awareness Week. And it's good to have chances to get together over things. I'm going to spend about five minutes talking about different styles of advocacy that I have used over the years, I do have a little bit of trouble speaking. So if you want me to repeat anything, I've said please feel free to ask me, it doesn't bother me doesn't hurt my feelings. Like it's okay. I'd rather that you understood. So I've been involved with advocacy all of my life. And it seemed to the type of advocacy seem to mold itself in a different way for each of the different things. And I'll just highlight some of the big ones. So the first was getting myself out of the institution, I went when I was seven years old, and it was just for kids with physical disabilities, and 18, I sign myself out to be able to live in the community. And that was just because I was fortunate to be turning 18 At a time when there were various demonstration projects happening around the province where you could live in the community and apartments shared with another person and attendance would be available to assist with all the activities of daily living not quite around the clock at first. But without that help, I was going to be set to live in a nursing home for seniors. And when you're 18. And you want to go to a Janis Joplin concert or something like that, you know, the thought of being a seniors home, you know, at that age was just like the last thing, so I was very lucky to do that. And so on that one, I kind of rode on the coattails of things that other people were doing, like I had an opportunity to give my ideas as to what I thought living in the community would look like. And my friend who is the same ages, as I hear about 17, we had a thing that described it. And the parents were angry with us, they said like, we want you to be serious. And what we described was, you know, having our own apartment attendants would come and go as we needed them. They could be friends if you wanted to. But it was you know, that wasn't important. And they didn't have to keep our chart and write down and things that they didn't like it was not a hospital environment. So that was my first thing. And then with the same organization, it was run by a board of directors who were not themselves people with experience of disability. It's right, like they worked in the fizzes biz, but they were not themselves people that needed these services. So over time, this is a whole nother story. But over time, the services started to deteriorate. And we ended up getting the Ministry of Community and Social Services to come and meet with us. They were funding the organization at the time and we said like, here's what's happening, you know, with your dollars it's supposed to be for helping us the dependently and instead, you know, people are not showing up for bookings, as we call it. People were getting the services that they were supposed to be able to get, and were able to get. And as a result of that there was kind of like a revolution, the people on the board, were very upset and insulted that we were criticizing their management of the organization. And especially since they were volunteers on the board, you know, where were we coming from, you know, being critical of that if we thought we could do better than, you know, go right ahead. And so we turned to the ministry person who was there at the time of that, it seems like there's a lot of openings on the board, suddenly, because people got offended, and they resigned. And so do that number of the consumers, as we called ourselves, a number of the consumers were on the board. So it became a kind of a hybrid. And that was like a really, that was like a long process, getting it done. And that's another thing altogether, so I call that Morrison takeover. And another thing that's happened before I left Morrison, whereas I had met my husband, and we were expecting a baby. And so when our baby was born, my husband was you know, almost like a single parent, because I wasn't able to assist by my ability to move my arms and so on was really wanted and still is. And I didn't realize like how left out, I would feel, you know, because they couldn't just jump in and grab the baby when she was crying, or, you know, just jump in and play with her when they want to see if she was happily laying somewhere where I could maybe interact with her, my husband was too tired to help me to do that. But he needed to have a rest because he was really, you know, 24/7 kind of thing as you are with a newborn. So I came up with the idea that I needed someone to help me look after the baby to do things the way I want to do. And in fact, the very first big fight my husband and I had was whether or not our daughter would be wearing socks, you know, she was like two months old, and it was middle of the summer. And it was like really hot. And my husband like didn't want her to wear socks, he said should be uncomfortable. And she kicked them off anyways. And I want her to look cute because they want the socks to grow. Because the dress anyways was the first big fight that we ever had. And that was kind of like came up with this idea of having a nurturing assistant. And so through the connections that we made at the Ministry of Indian social services, who were providing the funds for our tenant services, I made up a proposal explaining what this service would be, because at first they thought I was talking about babysitting. And it's like, no, no, it's not babysitting, because I'm there and I'm giving the same direction as they would if they're helping me to get dressed kind of thing. So they agreed that that would be something that would be within the scope of services. So they didn't really make a new policy or new rule, we didn't have to go to court, we didn't have to, you know, do anything like that. But we were able to use some of that service dollars for that purpose. And the staff would be separate and apart from the other attendants. Because didn't want to make it a situation where a person needed help, say, to go to the bathroom, and the attendant was busy with the baby, and you know, like to help me with the baby. And so we just thought we'd be able to have totally different folks hired to help with the baby. And that worked out really well. And it was a proposal that would phase down over time. So as my child was more physically independent, that I could interact more on a verbal basis than on a physical basis. So we were able to get that in place. And that was something that I thought of because I did it. But it became entrenched in Ontario with people who needed attendant services. So if a person has say direct funding, or they're in a support service, living unit feed with March of Dimes, or something like that, then the funding can be there to assist people to look after their children. And then that turned into being the fathers as well as the mothers, which is great, because a lot of fathers with disabilities want to be active with their children as well, right. So it just helped with making the connection and being able to play with your child and having a bit of a bond with them, and so on. So that was something that's happened without a major policy change, then I was involved with direct funding, which is how we ended up with having funding as a soft manager to provide for the tenants of home and that involve kind of like a coalition of people coming together. Much like the accessible housing network, it was kind of like that kind of grouping of people coming together who wants to see direct funding happen as an alternative for the other types of services that are in the community? And then like over time, I see you know, what has been described as like swarm of bees approach to advocacy that you see lots of people doing their little piece of it, you know, making their stings with their stingers and drawing attention. And so sometimes things like that could happen. And you know, the parents of children who are on the autism spectrum, were very successful with advocacy at the beginning of the Ford government when he came in, it was their funding arrangement was going to be changed in such a way that the level of service that could be provided with children would be far, far less and would end, you know, like at a certain time, even though autism is a condition that you have for your life. So I think like, you know, just today that it's, I think protecting the gains that we have won over time, and that also carving up the your turf, like with housing, like this is amazing, that is hit the political agenda, you know, we're seeing articles about it in that paper all the time, you know, so housing has become a big issue and other disability issues as well, I think are great, but we have to protect what we have one. So like attendance services, that we have one accessible transportation, we're seeing that getting rolled in and pulled back, you know, and cut back as what was being available. And so I think we need to do that and citizens with disabilities, Ontario organization, we dive in on issues that are decided at the provincial level, like at the other session that was said that municipal level is the best level to deal with certain issues, which is absolutely true. And a provisional level is the best level to deal with other issues. So we work on that we have started out action groups which form because we have, you know, a couple of people who want to work on something and work on a change for something and we will support the getting action group up and going and then whatever, whatever people want to do to make that action happen, whether it is climbing the stairs of the legislature, or you know, making our own Conway Viet way and blocking off a road with, you know, five or 10 people in their mobility devices, whatever she's to do that actually really come up with ideas and bring it to the board. And if you don't really agree with it, then you don't we're off and running. So that's really exciting. And I think that's going to allow us to make some really concrete progress. If you are not a member of citizens with disabilities, Ontario, membership is free. And you know, we'd love to have you join because we're very interested in people who are themselves people with disabilities who are residents of Ontario, and also allies of our organization who can assist us with different issues that we are involved in. So very, very happy to have you join on in any material that goes out afterwards, we'll make sure you know how to let us know that you'd like to apply for membership. And we're just going through our annual meeting and are getting reorganized as a you know, again after that, so I think it'll be a year where we can do lots of good things. I'm just gonna stop there.

Thank you, Tracy. I will say as a board member of citizens with disabilities Ontario, and I certainly will make sure that the organization's information is shared.

Thank you for joining us on The Accessibility Solutions podcast hosted by Linda Hines. We hope these discussions have inspired you and provided valuable insights into the world of accessibility and inclusion. If you're ready to take the next steps in creating an accessible and inclusive environment. We invite you to book a personalized accessibility solutions consultation with Linda as an experienced accessibility consultant Linda will work closely with you to develop innovative solutions tailored to your unique needs and challenges. Together you'll navigate the complexities of accessibility regulations, explore inclusive design principles and implement practical strategies to ensure equal access for all Don't miss this opportunity. And to make a real difference visit our website at solutions for accessibility.com. And that's the number four so solutions for accessibility.com schedule your consultation today, let's transform your space into an inclusive and welcoming environment for everyone. Thanks again for listening to the accessibility solutions podcast. Stay tuned for more empowering episodes as we continue our journey towards a more accessible world.