Whole Life, Whole Community Speaker Information.
I have a small estate and special needs planning practice in Camas, Washington. I draft Wills and Trusts for individuals and couples, but my passion is serving the disability community with special needs planning and advocacy for alternatives to guardianship.
Years ago, I was no longer practicing law and desperate for help for my own children and their challenges. I signed up for a Leadership Advocacy and Training Program put on by our local Arc chapter. I spent two hours per week in a room full of exhausted parents learning about Medicaid waivers, inclusion, IEPs etc. One of the trainers, a friend of mine to this day, said, “obviously none of us are lawyers, but we still need to learn to effectively advocate for not just our own kid but for all of the disability community.” I remember looking down at my hands for a long while and thinking, actually, I kind of am a lawyer. If anyone has the skills to be an effective advocate, I guess that should be me. So, in that moment, I decided to push myself in a new direction. I studied for the Washington Bar with audio lectures in my headphones-- at the playground, during naptime, and in the wee hours of the night. My children were not in school; we had zero family support. This was a very heavy lift. Caffeine made it possible.
Today, some of what I know about providing legal services to the disability community comes from my personal parenting journey. The rest is from focusing attention not just on the relevant laws and regulations, but also the social and government services available for disabled people over the lifespan.
For several years, I served on the board for PEACE NW, a tiny-but-mighty local nonprofit serving the I/DD (intellectual and developmental disabilities) community. I served five years on the governing board for the Developmental Disabilities Endowment Trust Fund, which manages a $77 million pooled, special needs trust in our state. I presently serve on the Clark County Developmental Disabilities Advisory Board, and I am also working to build a local coalition of disability service providers. I attend special needs planning conferences, CLEs and seminars on the regular. But more importantly, I’m an advocate. I participate in the Arc of Washington’s annual Advocacy Days up in Olympia inform state legislators on Medicaid cuts, supported employment, housing needs, and more. Throughout the year I continue to meet with legislators to follow up on issues affecting individuals with disabilities. This year I am vigorously advocating for legislation sunsetting the punitive practice of physical/chemical restraint and isolation for discipline of special needs children in the classroom.
Here’s how I see it:
Parents of children with I/DD cannot manage this hard journey on their own. They are in a constant fight to get their child’s needs met in school, medical care, and social settings. Those children grow into adults who face challenges in employment, housing, navigating government bureaucracy, and, again, social settings. Parents, and adults with I/DD, need educated advisors. They typically turn to estate planning attorneys asking about a special needs trust or a petition for guardianship, but they also need to know how these legal constructs fit into the bigger picture of the life of the disabled adult who may outlive them. SSI, SSDI, SSDAC, Medicaid, Healthcare for Disabled Workers, social security overpayments, the Endowment Trust Fund, ABLE accounts, Adult Family Homes, Supported Living Homes, POMS, new POMS, Eligible Designated Beneficiaries, Qualified Disability Trust, Waivers, DDCS, Transition, DVR, EIPs, 504s… there is more to special needs planning than drafting the special needs trust and sending folks on their way. If you draft a special needs trust that will so greatly affect the life of a vulnerable person, I believe you should also have a strong understanding of how it plays at the other end.
Credentials: I have a JD from Columbia University Law School, a BA from UC Berkeley, and hold a CAP® certification (Chartered Advisor in Philanthropy). I clerked for U.S. District Court Judge William J. Rea.