Jen Powley. a tireless advocate for disability rights and housing for people with disabilities, has been presented with the 2019 James McGregor Stewart Award. Jen is a tireless activist for the right of persons with severe physical disabilities to live independently, rather than in nursing homes
The City of Halifax limits access to summer camp to only three weeks for kids with disabilities. Kids without disabilities can go for the full eight weeks. Not only is that unfair, it also breaks the law, write the parents of twin boys with disabilities who are missing out as a result.
“Speaking as a mental health and addictions counsellor and an individual who has anxiety, I strongly believe reforms to this broken mental health system are seriously past due,” writes Raymond Sheppard.
A little bit of good news for anybody wants people labelled as living with intellectual disabilities to have better access to community-based housing options in Nova Scotia.
The Disability Rights Coalition is seeking to appeal a Human Rights Board of Inquiry decision that found that people with intellectual disabilities face no systemic discrimination in terns of housing needs.
Alex Kronstein continues to explore an Autism NS report, specifically the section about autistics wandering off. Here he tackles police interventions involving autistic people in general, and specifically racialized people. Alex also suggests some safety issues that aren’t getting the attention that they deserve.
There is always a reason why a neurodivergent person is a so called flight risk, and wanders off. That obvious observation is too easily lost when solutions such as tracking devices become the focus, writes Alex Kronstein.
News release: In light of a record award by a Human Rights tribunal to a Halifax Transit worker, Equity Watch, a Nova Scotia human rights advocacy group, is renewing its call for an independent forensic human resources audit of Halifax Regional Municipality.
“In the end I can say that what I have learned about myself is how incredibly strong I am, because I have to be,” said disability rights advocate Joanne Larade in February at a panel on the lack of suitable housing for people with severe disabilities. At the panel she explained what it is like to find yourself, at the age of 42, living among people with dementia, many twice your age. Joanne passed away early last week.
Media release: Over 1,000 Nova Scotians with disabilities are currently being warehoused in rehabilitation centres, nursing homes, and other institutional facilities. Over 1,500 persons with disabilities remain waitlisted for housing supports.