Media Contact: Phyllis Jones
(202) 673-1937 (desk) 202. 631.3077 (mobile)
[email protected]

The District of Columbia Department of Mental Health is sponsoring the Fourth Annual Olmstead Conference on November 10, 2011, from 10 am to 2 pm, in the auditorium of Saint Elizabeths Hospital, 1100 Alabama Avenue, SE.  Consumers of mental health care services and their families, advocates and health care providers are expected to participate.  

Co-sponsored with the Office of Disability Rights, the conference theme is “Successful Community Living: the Peer Advocate’s Perspective”. Self-identified peer advocates will share their stories of recovery and how they have been able to develop and maintain community support to live fully integrated lives in the community.

The conference also will promote the District’s Olmstead Plan to ensure that persons with disabilities have access to community based services and supports. The Office of Disability Rights, responsible for developing the Olmstead Plan, is working with other government agencies and community partners on a Community Integration Initiative based on the following guiding principles for people with disabilities:

• The right to live in the most integrated community setting appropriate to the needs of people with disabilities;
• The right of people to leave institutions and receive home and community-based services;
• An individual, client directed support plan written and updated regularly;
• Access to, and purchase of, self-directed care providers and selection of community supports;
• Identification, assessment and prioritization of the need for services from the spectrum of people with disabilities presently residing in institutions, and
• Training for consumers, families, advocates, community support networks and other identified stakeholders.

To register for the conference, contact Rossene Minard at (202) 673-4376 or [email protected]. Space is limited so early registration is encouraged. For more information, contact Vivi Smith, Director of the Office of Consumer and Family Affairs, on (202) 673-4377 or [email protected].