TASH Policy Town Hall: Medicaid

Policy Changes Affecting People with Disabilities in Plain Language

About the Series

Announcing a TASH Town Hall on Advocacy and Public Policy: How Does What Congress is Proposing Affect People with Disabilities?

TASH invites people with disabilities and their allies to join us for a Town Hall about what how the changes proposed by Congress will affect the lives of people with disabilities. This webinar will give people the information they need to tell their elected officials how they feel about the changes and what they want their official to do about it.

About the Presenters

A color portrait of Tia Nelis. She has long dark hair parted high on her head. She is wearing a maroon shirt and sitting in a beige high-backed chair.Tia Nelis is the Director of Policy and Advocacy for TASH. She comes to TASH after serving as Self-Advocacy Specialist at the Rehabilitation Research and Training Center within the Institute on Disability and Human Development at University of Illinois at Chicago. She also is one of the past chairperson of the National Organization of Self-Advocates Becoming Empowered. She founded and successfully promoted People First of Illinois, where she served as president. Tia, a long-time member of TASH, has received the Burton Blatt Award, awarded by the Illinois TASH chapter, as well as the Elizabeth Boggs award from the President’s Committee.

Tia has drawn on experiences relating to her own disability in promoting and demonstrating the benefits of empowerment for people with disabilities. She has wide experience in conducting training and advocating for progressive polices with legislators and public officials.

A portrait of Allan Bergman. He has a round face and mostly bald head. There are two wisps of grey hair on either side of his head and he has a grey mustache and chin beard. He is wearing a navy suite jacket and dark tie.

Allan I. Bergman is the CEO of HIGH IMPACT Mission-based Consulting & Training. He brings over 45 years of experience at the local, state and federal levels as a service provider, legislative advocate, strategic planner, and trainer. He has served as the CEO of six non-profit agencies and spent 18 years in Washington, D.C. as the Director of Government Relations for United Cerebral Palsy and as the CEO of the Brain Injury Association of America. He has spent 25 years working with Marc Gold & Associates on Customized Employment (C.E.).

Allan is a consultant to the National Conference of State Legislatures on a variety of Medicaid and Medicaid HCBS Waiver issues. With the Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy and the Employment First State Leadership Mentoring Program Allan has worked since 2012 on state Medicaid waivers to incentivize competitive, integrated employment and community living in 6 states. While CEO of a large community provider agency in Chicago, he developed the state’s first C.E. services in 2005. He co-designed Tennessee’s HCBS waiver; developed a statewide curriculum on Employment First and co-directed a project on Medicaid Waiver service definitions and reimbursement rates for the state of Ohio; created and managed 12-month provider agency C.E. transformation projects for Illinois and New York. In January 2017, he began a similar project with 7 provider agencies in Connecticut.

Allan also brings the perspective of the father of two adult daughters with disabilities. Mindy, who experiences Rett Syndrome, is now employed as a result of C.E.; her first job at 45 years of age.

 

Resources

 

How Do I Participate?

You can attend the Town Halls live via the Zoom webinar software. The series is free to all participants. Sign up using the form below. You will receive an e-mail reminder the Monday prior to the Town Hall webinar that will include a link to the webinar session and instructions on how to participate. You will receive the same reminder the day of the webinar.

Captioning will be provided. If you need any additional accommodation, please indicate what you need in the registration form below.

If you are unable to attend, each episode will be available as a recording on the TASH YouTube channel within a day of the live broadcast.

If you have any questions or additional requests concerning this series, contact Donald Taylor at dtaylor@tash.org or 202-495-3667.