FINISHED TRANSCRIPT 
EXPANDING HOUSING OPTIONS FOR 
 PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES  RENAISSANCE HOTEL CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 
 THURSDAY, AUGUST 9, 2012 
 9:00 A.M. TO 4:45 P.M.
This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. 
***

>> AMBER SMOCK: Now we're going to start the last long session of the day. It is about -- you can see on the PowerPoint it says forging alliances, how to network within the community. Examples on how to ensure fair housing enforcement.

As you can recall earlier today there was a lengthy discussion about the Fair Housing Amendments Act and so forth. 

I want to introduce our presenters. They are -- well, one of them is sick. Kimberly Borowicz who is an attorney for housing at Access Living is out today so she wasn't able to make it. 

We have our other two presenters. On the right we have Ken Walden the managing attorney for fair housing at Access Living. You worked at Access Living how many years now? 

>> KEN WALDEN: 11. 

>> AMBER SMOCK: And then we have Lisa Brennan who formerly worked with Access Living. 

Now she works at HUD and here at the fair housing office at region 5. So Lisa and Ken are going to take it away. 

Just so you know, I think we're supposed to end at 4:30? Okay. So 4:30. 

Be sure to ask them good questions and thank you for coming. 

>> My PowerPoint is not up there. 

>> AMBER SMOCK: Technical assistance. Lisa's PowerPoint is not on the computer apparently. 

>> I'm going to start talking anyway because I don't need the PowerPoint right away. So no worries. 

The PowerPoint isn't up yet. 

As Amber said, my name is Lisa Danna, I'm with -- not with the office of fair housing at the department of housing of urban development, but I'm actually an attorney with the office of the regional counsel. So I serve as the attorney for the office of fair housing and equal opportunity at HUD. As amber mentioned, long time ago I would say I am pleased to be here to speak with you on behalf of Access Living because that's where I started my legal career. And now that I am at HUD and actually worked at the state attorney general's office before coming to HUD, I am in a unique position to I think talk to you about forging alliances and how to network within the community, because I have a firm foot in both worlds, the disability rights movement and also government practice. 

So I have as you might say, the gift of perspective.

(Laughter.) 
Now I have -- also have the gift of 3 small children who are all the way out in DuPage County so I may not be able to stay with you for the entire panel, and if you have questions please feel free to interrupt me as I'm talking. I'm not sensitive. I will try to answer your questions as I go along. 

But before you ask me any questions, I want to ask you some questions. I've got about 6 of them. There is -- well I shouldn't say there is no wrong answers. I suppose there are. 

Here in Chicago the HUD office regional office that is here in Chicago is HUD region office region 5. 

Does anybody here know in their own state what region their HUD office is? Raise your hand. Call it out. Sign. Whatever you have to do. 

>> 6. 

>> MAN: 9. 

>> Anybody here who doesn't know the regional -- the. 

Who here knows the name of director of fair housing and equal opportunity if their region? 
(Show of hands.)

Not many. This is going to get harder. 

Anybody here know the name of the director of the office of public and Indian housing in their HUD office? Not at their public housing office HUD office of public and Indian housing. 

One. Well, that I know the CHA people know. 

Okay. Worse. Anybody here know the name of the director of the office of community planning and development at HUD if their region? One. Not even CHA knows that. 

Does anybody here know the name of the regional administrator for your regional office? Beto didn't know that last week. 

Does anybody know what the regional administrator does? No. 

Okay. One more. Promise. Does anybody here know the name of a HUD investigator, grant rep, or public housing specialist in any region? Excellent. That's really telling. 

If you don't know one, Maggie Smith is from my office. She's right there. Now you know a HUD investigator. Okay. 

Now I ask you these questions for a really specific reason, and I have this terrible PowerPoint that I brought along with me which is our organizational chart. 

But the reason I wanted to ask you these questions is, that when we think about forging alliances, we tend to get a little bit romantic about the concept of forging alliances. We have an idea, and I think we all sort of have a little bit of a strange and sometimes positive notion of that. 

So a couple weeks ago I took my kids to see the movie Brave. And in this movie there is a princess. The princess is upset because she is being forced to select a prince from another kingdom to marry, and she is being told that she needs to make this marriage to be in alliance between two kingdoms in order to protect and serve the people of those kingdoms. 

She is not happy about it. It is a great story about the tension between personal sacrifice and the importance of alliances. 

In the disability rights movement we have our own grand stories about forced alliances with the government. Like, for instance, now I'm being videotaped -- I would normally say something else, but I won't swear.
(Laughter.) 

The really kick butt protest where disability advocates shut down a federal building in order to get regulations for the implementation of Section 504, right? That's a forced alliance with government. 

Or when disability advocates fought traffic here in Chicago and chained themselves to buses to express to our transit authority that we want accessible transportation and we mean business. 

Tease are the pictures that -- these are the pictures we hang on our walls in our homes and offices and stories we tell our friends and colleagues and young advocates. They are stories of forced alliances with the government. 

Because in creating these alliances and forcing these alliances with the government, the government says to the disability community, we realize we better ally with you because if we don't, we'll never be able to serve this community and if we don't serve this community we're going to face the consequences of not doing so. Those are forced alliances with government. And they are effective, but they are not the only way. And any great organizer, many of whom sit in this room, will tell you that as sexy and effective as protests often are, they are often employed because an effort at peacefully forging alliances has failed. 

Forging alliances is, as I think Ken eloquently expressed in a phone call the long gauge. Forging alliances is a long game. 

And when you are talk to government whether that be local or state or federal, you need to build your rapport from are the inside out and from the bottom up. 

If you want to be prepared to meet with the secretary of the department of housing and urban development tore D -- or DOE or DOT or whoever you want to meet with, you want to know everything about that agency. The programs it has. The regulation they are working with. And to have a rapport with somebody within that agency who can recommend you to somebody above them, to somebody above them, to somebody above them. 

As somebody who is really great, who knows what they are talking about. Right? 

So the reason why I provide you with this org chart and there is more than one of them, to give you the idea of the structure of HUD so you know what you are working with. 

Is this a button? Wow. And now I turned it off. And there it is. I don't know how to make it go forward. 

There is only one slide? Okay. So now there is only one slide. There used to be 3 slides. Sorry. I can certainly -- you can actually get any of the things I was going to show you off of HUD's website. Www.HUD.com.

>> Lisa, excuse me, they are over here. You had some other handouts that we did as handouts, not as -- 

>> Lisa: So maybe some are in your book and that's good, too. 

There is an organizational structure to HUD as an agency, but if you look in the organizational chart you will see that HUD has many different program offices, and within each one of those program offices there is also an internal structure. 

You have to find your allies within that structure. So let's talk first about building rapport. 

The message I want to bring to you today is to expand your web whether you are working with HUD or another federal agency, because I'm with HUD I'm going to use HUD as an example. But this pertains to any federal, state, or local agency. Expand your web. 

Within HUD you can for the mission of the disability rights movement through any program office. You can pick a program office, any program office. As the title this panel suggestions as well as your responses to my questions just a few moments ago, the majority of you are accustomed to working with the office of fair housing and equal opportunity, or FHEO. And that makes sense because FHEO is the civil rights off of the department of housing and urban development. 

But disability policy is not confined to FHEO. Other program offices within HUD deal with disability policy every single day, and you need to deal with all of those program offices, especially those that administer and monitor the housing and programs that impact consumers with disabilities the most. 

Like, the office of public and Indian housing, or PIH. Office of public and Indian housing at HUD is where a lot of our folks are getting their vouchers to live in the community or seeking vouchers to live in the community, or living in public housing that is or is not accessible. 

Or the office of community planning and development, CPD, where the big grant programs like the community development block grants, CDBG and HOME and 811 are funded and monitored. Monitored is an important word here. 

When they go out to monitor how HUD's grant dollars are spent, are they looking for disability issues? No. Why not? Because they are bad people? No. As I told my teenager last week, the definition of ignorant is not knowing. It is not a bad thing. It is not knowing. People don't know what they are looking for and they are not going to know until we educate them. That's a big part of my job. I'm in one region in one office in the United States. You are in every region in the entire United States. I need some help. 

So you need to lobby the right people. Once you know what program office you are working with, you need to make a contact in that office. And your contact, who is the appropriate contact for you as an individual depends on what your role is in your organization, or your role in the disability community. That's how you are going to determine who your personal contact is going to be.

If you are dealing with consumers and specific consumer issues, so every day people are calling you on the phone, they are asking you questions about their housing, they are asking you questions about their funding, they are asking personal questions, then you are going to want to deal with HUD staff who are handling the day to day business of the agency. 

So in fair housing, that's going to be the intake staff and the investigators. The intake staff and the investigators are the people that make direct contact with consumers. Someone like me in the office of counsel is not really talking to consumers on a daily basis. It is not like an attorney in a nonprofit who deals directly with consumers. Someone like me doesn't do that. I deal with the client or the program office. So your contact is going to be the intake person or your contact is going to be the investigator. 

In public housing that's going to be a public housing specialist. Up don't want to -- you don't want to call the director of public and Indian housing at HUD and ask consumer questions because that person is busy, that person is not going to answer your question, that person is not -- it is not that they don't want to, it is that they don't have that kind of time to talk to us and every other nonprofit or consumer in, say, the city of Chicago or the Great Lakes region to answer questions. So you are not going to be able to build a rapport. You might goat a hold -- get a hold of him. They might answer your question. But you are not going to build a rapport and relationship with that person. That person is going to refer you to the person who do the day to day work, the public housing specialists. 

So let's say that you want to negotiate a transfer of one of your tenants and you are getting no where with the housing authority -- you wouldn't be in Chicago of course -- you are going to take that concern to a public housing specialist, not to FHEO. You want to transfer somebody, first you start with public housing, because if you go to FHEO first, now you are in almost an adversarial position. I called FHEO. They will go down do public housing and something is wrong. Why would you do that? 

If you are dealing with a person who is a day to day person in public housing, you build that relationship, you can go to that person. You may end up in fair housing, let's say the public housing specialist can't help you or you don't have a good relationship. You may end up in fair housing, but start in public housing. 

Two, if you are dealing with policy issues and those policy issues are local as opposed to nationwide. Okay, local and program specific. Your point of contact is going to be the program center director or the center director. 

For instance, let's say that you live in a community and work in a community and you go out and they are issuing their consolidated plan or they are issuing their annual plan. And you notice that their analysis of impediments to fair housing choice includes nothing to address the needs of people with disabilities. 

Typically that's something that you are going to see and you may address to the office of fair housing and that wouldn't be inappropriate, but the person who is going to approve that analysis of impediments and the person who is going to approve the consolidated plan and the annual plan and the capers which says what we did with our annual plan works with the office of community planning and development. CPD. 

So if you have a concern, the first person you want to talk to is the rep that monitors that community. So you should know who the rep is that monitors that community in the community you work in, because not only do they monitor that community, but they are the ones who approve the funding for that community. They are the ones who know when the funding cycle runs and you are very -- and I mean very small window of opportunity to challenge a certification exists. It is not the office of fair housing. The office of fair housing can help you, but this person is the number one person on the line. 

And they want to know these things. They want to know if there are objections that they just don't know about. You are there to educate them and they are there to help you.

So that's why it is important for you to have a relationship with that grant rep. 

Now sometimes these issues get serious and you might want to go to the director of community planning and development, but you are not going to come straight out of your CIL and into the director's office. You are going to need someone to introduce you to the director who says, this person has a legitimate concern, comes from a legit mate agency, has an interest in this. You should meet with them. That's why you want your grant rep before you get to your director. 

So now, if you are dealing with large policy issues that are regionwide and you all -- now, region, so think about it this way: You've got your local, then you got your state, now I'm talking about your region. So Chicago region 5 is mainly the Great Lakes states. 

Let's say I have a regionwide issue and I already met with the regional director for my region, and I'm not getting where I need to go. Or that person only has limited power to act, then the next person I'm going to want to see is my regional administrator. I want to take my regional director with me, but I want to meet with my regional administrator. 

So if we're talking right now about deinstitutionalization, HUD is talking about this, HUD is working on this, it is a regionwide issue. So I'm going to go to -- I'm going to take with me the regional director of the department -- I mean of the office of fair housing and equal opportunity and then I'm going to talk to the regional director of public housing, and they both report to someone called the regional administrator. 

The regional administrator is the secretary's representative in your regional office. He or she reports to the Deputy Secretary of HUD. He or she is a political, and you know, it is a political appointment, that makes them care a lot about what the community thinks about them. 

So you want to meet with your regional administrator. You shouldn't get too attached to your regional administrator, though, because it is a political position so sometimes the regional administrator goes away. And you want to work with that person who is a direct connection then to your headquarters' office. We'll talk to the people in DC. Or as we call it -- no, I shouldn't say that. 
(Laughter.) 

At the point you are meeting with your regional administrator, you'll probably be meeting with more than one program center director. When I met with the regional director last week about Olmstead implementation, we had at the table multifamily housing, community planning development, public and Indian housing and the office of fair housing and equal opportunities, and we also had somebody from our field policy management there. Everybody at the table, they are there at his behest, he's the regional administrator. 

Now the regional administrator is also the person who is your introduction to the people in Washington D.C. because if this issue grows and is one of national importance as many of the issues we deal with are nationwide issues, that person is going to be your introduction to the secretary or the Deputy Secretary. That's how you are going to get to the policy people at HUD. So all of the public housing directors report to a public housing director in headquarters who is their contact for the entire nation. All of the community planning and development directors report to somebody in headquarters who is the person over fair housing nationwide policy for fair housing, public policy for the nation and then community planning development, multifamily, on and on. 

There is always an office in headquarters that is going to be dealing with nationwide policy issues. 

So if you want to have entree to headquarters' people and policy makers and headquarters and eventually the secretary, it is a good idea to come through your region. 

Sometimes you are going to have to go to the secretary without anybody from your region, but I wouldn't recommend it for this reason: The first thing the secretary is going to do is they are going to call the regional office. That's the first thing. Secretary's office is going to call the regional office and say, I have some advocates here. The problems they are complaining about look like a lot of them are in your region, what are you doing about it? What is going on? And then if your regional office doesn't know what is going on, that is going to be a more difficult conversation. 

So I would think that you would really think about at least going through your regional administrator before you go up to headquarters. 

Now if you are working on a well coordinated nationwide policy issue, let's say you are working with the National Council on Disability or NCL or you are going in on one giant policy initiative, this is a good place for you to talk to the assistant secretaries. So aside from people being over sort of the main office of public housing or the maybe office of CPD, you all know there is an assistant secretary that reports directly to the secretary over your area. Most people here have dealt with at one point or another the assistant secretary for fair housing and equal opportunity, and we certainly had our current assistant secretary out here a number of times for disability awareness. But it's not the only -- (Sneeze) 

>> KEN WALDEN: Wow! Wake up! 
(Laughter.) 

>> Lisa: Okay. If you want to educate your assistant secretary, the assistant secretary for the different program areas are people that you want to know. And you want them to know and understand your issues, because they meet regularly with the secretary. And they want the secretary is a political appointment, so is the deputy, so are the assistant secretaries. They are interested in what the community thinks about them and interested in what they can get involved in that's going to make the community like them and respond. 

You know, they are a great person to make your point person in terms of getting the office of the secretary up to speed on your issue. Educate your assistant secretaries, plural, on what it is you are talking about. Try to get them talking to each other about the same issue. And then they can inform the secretary so that when you walk in the door you can get down to talking turkey. You don't have to start with, this is, you know, Olmstead is a Supreme Court decision and it held -- you want to walk in the door and say, okay, what are we doing about Olmstead implementation and here are my ideas. 

So now you know who you want to talk to. You know you need to talk to more than one program office. You know that you need to talk to people at every level within the program offices. 

How do you meet these folks and start building a rapport with them? What's the way that you could do that? 

Ask, attend, invite, infiltrate. That's how you are going to do it. Ask, attend, invite, infiltrate. 

Ask. You know, if you have questions, you should ask HUD your questions. As I was sitting in a meeting last week with all of these senate directors, and we were talking about disability policy, and we were trying to figure it out how we would -- what proposals we could make. We had a really hard time because the web of regulations that every program office has to deal with are really complex, and the people who work in those departments are regulatory experts in their area. But the different program areas don't know each other's regs, and so as one person brings up an idea, another person says, well, we really can't do that because this regulation or this PIH notice or this grant requirement won't let you do this or this or this or this. Right? It is a tangled web. 

We need to get educated ourselves about those programs so that we understand what they mean to us. And it is really hard to figure it all out. You need experts. The only way you are going to do that is ask them to educate you. So when you have a question, the simple start is, call those people I told you about before. Call your intake person. Call your investigator. Call your grant representative. And say, what do the regs say about this. Or I have a consumer with this issue, what does it say about this. So you'll start to get to know them. 

And then ask them to come out and train you on the complex things. HUD will come out and train you. 

You know, I think when you think about bureaucrats people have a really sort of negative view of bureaucrats, but most of these people came into the jobs not just because they wanted a J-O-B, they came into the job because they wanted public service and not starve. So they have a decent paycheck but they want to do public service. A lot of people that work at HUD are community planners, and they want to know -- they spent all day long with these regulations and negotiating these NOFAs and they want to know that you care what it is they are working on, they want to tell you about it. Invite them out to train you. Give dilemma very -- give them a very specific agenda of what it is you want to know and they will come to you and train you. So ask. If you have a question, call the program office, find one at your level, ask the questions and let them educate you on their perspectives. 

Attend. If there is a HUD sponsored training, attend it. If there isn't one, ask them to make one for you. 9 times out of 10 they'll come and that's your opportunity to educate them. 

Because as they are training you, you are training them. The questions that you ask at these conferences tells HUD what it is that you are interested in. And then their wheels start to turn and they start to think, okay, how do I connect this with what I do. 

If there is a stakeholders meeting, attend it. Because 9 times out of 10 there is only going to be one person in the room who is going to be dealing with the disability issue. It is going to be you. So if you want disability to be on the agenda. You have to attend. You have to be there.

Now, Beto from Access Living and I got into a spat a few years ago about just this topic. The secretary was holding a meeting in Washington D.C. and he would invite disability advocates to attend. And Beto didn't really think that this was a great use of his time because the agenda was kind of squishy and other people had -- you know, we all come from different background and we have different things we want to ask of HUD and he didn't think it was an effective use of his time. 

And I at that time and today still say, you should attend, because even if you are just there and you make one comment, the secretary knows who you are and they've heard your agencies name every time you walked in the room. And if you do get a chance to say what it is you are there for and what your mission is, it has been heard. And it also lets you know what missions are out there that are counter to your mission. We all come with different agendas. They are not always in sync with one another. We all want to serve the disability community but everybody sees it in a different way. 

So I would say if there is a stakeholder meeting, attend. Invite. Invite not just HUD, state, local, federal employees to your conferences. Invite them to your social events. Invite them to your disability pride parades. Invite them. They will come.

You know, a lot of people who work at HUD are themselves advocates in their own communities, are themselves individuals with disabilities, are themselves radicals and progressives and people who want to stir for change. They will hear you and understand you better if you invite them to your inner circle and let them hear what it is you have to say. 

Don't be afraid. Bureaucrats will not shrivel if you swear in front of them, or if you get angry, or if you are passionate. They are, too. We're just people just like you. And we want to know what's a burning issue for you. Because that's how we take that experience back to our work and say, okay, now how do I apply what I do every day to make what I do every day meaningful. Not just a big book of regulations that looks like this (indicating). So get them invested in your mission and they will help you figure out the tangled web of regulations and rules and program rules to get through your mission. 

And finally, infiltrate. When jobs come open in the government, apply for them. If you have a really great advocate, have them apply for those jobs. 

When I left Access Living I went to the attorney general's office to the Disability Rights Bureau, I was the first person to head the bureau that came out of the disability rights movement. Every other person before me was just a random attorney who got assigned to the job. So people came in without disability agendas. 

We turn the office around in a year. We were doing things 100% differently because the perspective was different. Right? 

When Max Bertosa left here he went to the Department of Justice and he is now in the housing and civil enforcement section and he is litigating cases. You think when a disability case comes across his desk he might do it a little bit differently than a attorney who came out of the law school went to the Department of Justice and that's what they did for a living? Of course. His perspective is much different. 

Karen Tamley left here, she's a commissioner for the city. For the mayor's office of people with disabilities. That office is completely different. Why? Because her perspective is different. She's a disability rights advocate who now works for the government. So here we are, your neighbors, your friends, your other advocates, but now we're bureaucrats. But we bring our own perspective to the job. We educate the people around us. And it directs the vision -- we get to put our vision to the work, our work comes out differently. 

So I would say that apply for those jobs. Have people you trust apply for those jobs, and then you'll know who you are working with when you walk into a meeting. You'll know that they know what you are doing. 

And pay attention for changes within all of the administrations. There is an election coming up. A lot of these jobs even if the administration stays the same, a lot of jobs will change. Political positions change even if the president doesn't.

So those are opportunities. When those assistant secretary positions open up, that's an opportunity. When those regional administrator positions open up, that's an opportunity. And we want to make sure that we take advantage of those opportunities to recommend our own candidates. Right? Why not? So those are opportunities. 

And also recognize when new people get jobs, you that need to be one of the first people they meet with. For instance, does anybody know that the Department of Justice has a new Disability Rights Bureau section chief? Department of Justice has a new Disability Rights Bureau section chief. That's a big deal. It had the same section chief a long time. They had someone briefly in between. But for the most part the same person years and years of the how that person decides what the agenda is going to be for the Disability Rights Bureau nationally at the Department of Justice is going to be largely directed by that person. Get to know them. Introduce yourself. Let them know what is important to the disability rights community. 

Did you know that the Department of Justice now has an Olmstead office? Where attorneys are working on the issue of Olmstead. That's what they do. There is a section chief for that. Are we meeting with them? Do they know what the disability community wants to do with Olmstead implementation federally? If not, talk to that person. They are new. 

So what I wanted to give you today is just this view that within all structures, state, local, federal, within a giant nonprofit, there are these different levels. Right? It is a long rapport building game of understanding each other and forging an alliance that's based on a rapport of trust, where we trust each other because we've worked together so long that we have a nice marriage going. 
And that that is a long game and it starts inside out, and it is doable, and it is achievable, and you can do that. So I hope that I've offered you at least a little perspective today. 

If you have if I questions, I would be more than happy to answer them.

>> KEN WALDEN: Hi, everybody. So I realized that if you don't remember anything I say today, you will remember what a microphonic sneeze sounds like, feels likes or how a interpreter would sign a microphonic sneeze. 
(Laughter.)  

I will discuss how Centers for Independent Living or other advocacy organizations can leverage or collect -- leverage with or collaborate with attorneys. 

I'm going to start with a few questions. And I appreciate -- I'm pretty sure the answer to this is no but it usually is. 

By the way, during of course of this, I would love for you to participate. Questions are encouraged. But I'm kind of reserved the right to move forward in some instances and have that question be addressed by me later on to move through with the material. 

Also I should mention that Kimberly Borowicz was going to do this presentation with me. She's been sick for a few days. She's sick today. So you are just stuck with me. 

Also, purposefully the PowerPoint that is in your materials and the PowerPoint that will appear up here has minimal information. The reason is, I'm going to ask questions and try to elicit information from you. 

If I provided all the answers to the questions in the booklet, then this wouldn't be very fun at all. 

At the end of the presentation myself or Darrell or a combination of the two of us will hand out the answers to the questions. 

First question is: Do any of you have attorneys on your respective Center for Independent Living staffs? Just raise your hand or clap. 
(Show of hands.)

You do? Very good. Where are you guys from? 

>> WOMAN: Not as attorneys but they just happen to be -- 

>> KEN WALDEN: They happen to be attorneys. How about you? 

>> WOMAN: St. Louis. 

>> KEN WALDEN: You have attorneys doing legal work for yourself. Very good. 

For others, have you ever worked with attorneys? Collaborating with attorneys. Several people there. Couple people there. Very good. 

So together, let's try to identify ways that lawyers can help. Or in other words, why in the world would a Center for Independent Living want to work with lawyers. 

So what ideas do you have? In what ways might a lawyer or lawyers help in your advocacy efforts? I see a hand here.

>> WOMAN: ADA enforcement. 

>> KEN WALDEN: So legal enforcement. A variety of issues is a rather common way to utilize attorneys. 

What other ways? Anybody? Come on. I need some help. Anybody. 

>> MAN: We had to bring in an attorney to enforce mediation or to encourage the young party to follow through on their agreement. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Okay. So there is classic kind of legal representation. ADA enforcement, bringing an action or threatening to bring an action. Trying to make certain that an agreement is complied with by another party. 
Let's take off the enforcement cap. What other things might lawyers do? 

>> MAN: Helping to interpret rules and regulation. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Very good. To explain or education rules and regulations that you are struggling with, or that you want to advocate in front of HUD regarding. Good. Education, good. What else? 

>> WOMAN: We sometimes use attorneys to help set up complicated financial things. Special needs trusts or things like that. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Okay. Again some individual -- 

>> WOMAN: Contracts. 

>> KEN WALDEN: For consumers? 

>> WOMAN: Yes, sir. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Ken is fine. You made me nervous. 
Yes, for setting up special needs trusts. It is not necessarily enforcement work but it is transaction work and it is needed by a client. 

>> WOMAN: My colleague and I have statutes. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Right. So legislative work. Proposing statutes for state and local. State and local? Yes. She says state and local. So coming up with proposed statutes that help advance the movement. 

Other things might be testifying from front of your legislative body, submitting proposal, submitting written testimony on your behalf about pending legislation.

What do you guys do in St. Louis? I'm curious. 

>> WOMAN: All of the above. Also participants may have just questions that need clarification or just information. That lawyers can help. 

>> WOMAN: I use our attorney to write contracts and agreements between our contractors and also to do regulatory agreements and questions I have regarding that. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Okay. So almost general counsel stuff like that a corporation might have general counsel work on contracts. Agreements with vendors. Transactional work. Good. Then some advocacy stuff as well. 

You might use lawyers to create user friendly educational documents. To create some two or three page description of the fair housing act. Or certain title of the ADA or a local or state law that protects people with disabilities. You might use lawyers to develop a position statement on a topic, if you have policy people, you are thinking of developing a policy position, the lawyers might help in developing a policy position on something HUD should do or something your state legislature should do, or something an administrative agency should do or another government agency should do, or your CIL's position on Olmstead or position on housing choice vouchers. There are a variety of ways you can use lawyers to help you.

All right. Covered a lot of this.

All right. Where might you find -- if you don't have them on staff, where might you find lawyers to work with? Where would you go -- what are some thoughts? How would you find them? Lisa spent a lot of time talking about forging partnerships with HUD. Collaborating with HUD officials in various levels of the bureaucracy. 
How about lawyers? Go ahead. 

>> MAN: Vermont legal aid has a disability law practice which is specific for people with disabilities. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Perfect. There are public interest organizations in your town, in your state and legal services organizations that do a variety of legal work on behalf of people who can't afford lawyers. And on issues that affect lower income populations. 

Many have disability rights attorneys. Disability benefits attorneys. Attorneys who work a lot with people with disabilities. That's a ready source, you might try to collaborate and form a partnership with the local office on disability issues. 

What else? Each state has one of these. Richard? 

>> MAN: I was going to say sometimes you can find very strange bed fellows with other organizations that you normally wouldn't work with, but they may have inhouse counsel and may have similar interests and you may engage in litigation jointly or have other work in common. 

As an example, when I was in Arkansas at mainstream at little rock, we partnered with the Arkansas medical society on a Medicaid rate lawsuit against the state. Successfully I might add. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Very good. That is a way to find lawyers in other organizations. 

>> WOMAN: Most of the bar associations. 

>> KEN WALDEN: The bar association. Try to develop a relationship with your bar association. Contact someone who works there who may be involved. They may have someone who is involved in pro bono and trying to promote pro bono among lawyers and law firm. Take him or her to lunch and talk to them about trying to find some pro bonos for your enforcement effort, education effort, legislative effort, and he or she may able to put you in touch with some lawyers who have a like interest. 

So we have public interest organizations. We have other organizations, strange bed tell fellows as Richard said, bar associations. What else? Where do lawyers go to school? Law school. Law schools often have legal clinics that focus on poverty law issues. They may even have a disability law clinic. And that's a nice source to go to. They may be looking for a big project. They may be looking for activities, challenging activities, fun activities, rewarding activities, tough activities for their law students to handle in their clinic. 

If you can develop a good relationship with the clinic and the clinic professors, that's a really good partnership to develop. 

And then we touched on this, there are law firm. Some law firms I know you come across -- there is a lot of geographic diversity here so I imagine some come from urban area, medium sized, suburban areas, smaller towns. You may have large firms, midsize firms, small firms, teeny tiny practices. But lawyers are obliged ethically or encouraged strongly I should say to do pro bono work. 

Some of the bigger firms actually have pro bono programs, and pro bono partners or pro bono coordinators and they are looking for exciting things for their lawyers to do. 

We work in tandem at Access Living with law firms on bigger cases and it is a great partnership. They really like it. It gets them out of the kind of hum drum work they may be doing. They get to represent real people with real problems and try to do some good. 

So you can try to find out who these pro bono partners are, coordinators are, like Lisa said it takes some time. Try to develop a relationship with that firm or that lawyer or those groups of lawyers, and you might be able to recruit them to do some stuff for you, like educate, enforce, legislative work, et cetera. 

Now, if you develop a relationship with lawyer on enforcement work, and you have a case or cases or a big issue, we have a certain methodology at Access Living that we more or less follow 99% of the time, but not always. Let's say you have a client who has a really good case and you want to find him or her a lawyer. Maybe it is a big issue or just her issue. In terms of enforcing the law, what strategy do you want to employ in terms of trying to help or having a lawyer help that client? Do you want to have the lawyer file a compliant right away? Try to negotiate a resolution. Write a letter. What is your thinking about that? 

I can tell you what we do, but what is your thinking about that? What is the best way to go about this? Anybody have some thoughts? 

>> We have a strong independent mind set. So we normally help the consumer draft their own letter, advocating for themselves. That's our first step. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Good. 

>> WOMAN: Then we have a lawyer come into play. 

>> KEN WALDEN: When the lawyer comes into play, what happens then? 

>> WOMAN: Then it is the attorney's letter or send out the letter that they are represented by an attorney. Then we do investigate -- investigations. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Right, that's what we often do at Access Living, we get calls and compliance about discrimination for instance. To large extent we try to educate the resident, the tenant, perspective tenant to advocate for him or herself so they can resolve it on their own. It minimizes our resources especially if they can successfully advocate for themselves. That doesn't always work as we know. A lot of times it won't work. 

So then our next step would be that we would send a letter with a lawyer's signature which addresses the same or similar issues that the tenant or resident or the client presented in his or her own self-advocacy effort. 

Now why do you think we send a letter rather than file a complaint right away? Why do you think we do that? Anybody want to offer a rationale? 

>> WOMAN: Gives the opportunity to remedy the situation. This is the voice of God. Isn't that fun? 
(Laughter.) 

>> KEN WALDEN: Say it again. 

>> WOMAN: Gives the opportunity to remedy the situation. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Much more quickly. Litigation takes a long time. Once you file a lawsuit it can take weeks, months, years, decades to resolve, so if you can resolve it expeditiously with a letter, and a few phone calls, maybe a few weeks or months of negotiations, it is a much quicker way to resolve it. 

The other thing it does and this is important for Access Living, it helps preserve our reputation. We don't want to be seen as an organization that willy nilly files complaints against people because that doesn't look good. Even though it may be completely and utterly justified in many instances, we don't want to do it because we don't want to have the reputation of willy nilly filing complaints against people. Also judges don't like it. Judges want to see that in advance of filing a lawsuit there has been an effort to try to resolve the case without litigation. Very good.

So you found your lawyer for your cause. Be it enforcement effort or education, researching a project. A topic. Writing a position paper. Doing some legislative work. 

How do you manage the relationship with that lawyer? Let's talk about that. How do you initiate and maintain positive relationships with lawyers. 

Let's start with the first contact. Someone has been identified in a firm who is interested in your issue but you have never talked to him or her before and you want to present your issue. What do you think is important to do initially? This will be important with respect to HUD as well. 

Go ahead. 

>> MAN: The first step I would do is meet. I would meet the attorney. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Good. 

>> MAN: To have sort of a meet and greet. Give a where I'm coming from type of dissertation. 

>> KEN WALDEN: That's great. Just like anything else, you have a relationship with your lawyer or your hairdresser, your doctor, you want to meet with them. It just changes the dynamic considerably if you have a face-to-face with somebody. 

In terms of what you say or what you present, how do you think you should be? Do you have to sound lawyerly? God I hope no. 

>> MAN: I think you have to be calm and present the facts as you see them. And listen. I think active listening during the exchange is crucial. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Good. I would say things to also remember would be to be very clear and relatively concise. Crystallize the issue. Okay? If you come to him or her with a plethora of complaints or issues some of which may or may not be related to the focal issue you want him or her to help you with, you may lose him or her in the morass of stuff. Because you know so much. You've been doing this for so many years. And you feel this so intuitively, that you may feel inclined to show everything. You know, share it all with the lawyer. But they don't need to know everything. They really want to know what is the focal issue you want some help with. Because they probably don't have time for the 3-hour lecture. They have time for lunch. In an hour you can clearly and concisely explain the issue at hand. 

Giving a lot of lead time is critical because it takes a long time for lawyers to analyze the merits of the case, if it is a case, or merit situation from a legal standpoint. You may have the moral high ground. You will almost always have the moral high ground but you may not have the legal basis for your high ground. Because if you don't, that will be a tough row to hoe and the lawyer will help you figure that out. 

Be concise. If you need help right away the next day, yesterday, that's going to be really difficult. 

Go ahead. 

>> MAN: I have a question. If you have the time, the lead time, would you recommend researching on your own a little bit to kind of bring to the table where you think it might fit? 

>> KEN WALDEN: Yes. That would be helpful. Yeah, if you can give some hints, some suggestions, some research material to help the person get started, especially if they know nothing about this area of the law. Fair housing handbook. Short explanation of the ADA. Anything will help. And the lawyer will read it. And it will be extremely useful. That's a good point. 

Be prepared for lots of questions. You'll get a loft questions from lawyers -- lot of questions from lawyers. They will ask you a ton of questions. Things you will have anticipated. Things you will not have anticipated. Things that will piss you off. But they are asking you this to make sure that -- or to analyze the case from a legal standpoint to see if there is good merits here. So don't be put off by that even if you are pissed off, don't be put off by it. There is a reason they are asking those questions.

And as you said, be prepared to provide some documents. They may be factual documents if it is an enforcement effort. Or it may be research materials as well. 

Lawyers are bound by ethical rules. One of those has to do with conflicts. Conflicts of interest. Anybody know what that means? What does that sound like? What do you think? We need some help from this side of the room (indicating). This side doing a lot of work here. 

Anybody here know what conflicts is or conflicts of interest? Oh, jeez. That's bright. 

Anybody? 

>> WOMAN: I'll try it. Basically means that they have some vested interest in how the situation is decided. 

>> KEN WALDEN: They or -- 

>> WOMAN: They or maybe their company. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Or their clients. Perfect.

Lawyers are bound by conflicts rules. That means if you contact a lawyer about suing a Johnson real estate company for fair housing discrimination, the lawyer is going to have to do a conflicts check to make sure that he or his firm, or she and her firm haven't represented Johnson management company, whatever company I called it, in the past. Or it is a current client. Or maybe even a client they want to get, they are going to stay away from that case. So they may have a conflict. 

Unfortunately, lawyers in bigger firms have some huge conflicts sometimes because they represent a field of industries, field of interests, so in the healthcare industry, hospitals, nursing homes, you name it. Some of our biggest adversaries get head counsel from the big firms. So just know they have to run a conflict check to make sure they don't have a conflict on your issue. 

All right. Maintaining a positive relationship, how might you maintain a positive relationship? 

Now I would like you to put your CIL cap on. Your advocacy cap on. Your disability rights cap on. You have got a lawyer helping you, right? But you are a disability rights organization. So what do you want to avoid? What would be the scariest thing or the worse thing that could happen? Anybody? Over there? You want do try again? Go ahead. 

>> WOMAN: I didn't have -- I didn't know -- I don't know. 
(Laughter.) 

>> KEN WALDEN: Okay. Anybody. Anybody. 

>> MAN: Constantly calling them up. 

>> KEN WALDEN: You don't want to constantly call them up. But what do you want to make sure they are aware of. 

>> WOMAN: Don't -- 

>> MAN:

>> KEN WALDEN: Confidentiality. I'm thinking of something even more significant and global. Remember, I advised you to put your disability rights caps on. 

Here, lawyer, take the case. Now what? Let's say they are representing your CIL, or they are representing a client in a monumental issue. 

>> MAN: You still have to let them do it. 

>> KEN WALDEN: What? 

>> MAN: I would have to let them do it. 

>> KEN WALDEN: That's the point. I don't know that you want to let them do it because you have the disability rights perspective. They don't. They have no clue. They have no clue. Trust me. They often have no clue. 

Go ahead. 

>> WOMAN: If they want to win the case by using pity or using another strategy that's really counter to the IL philosophy or what we believe, that could be a huge problem. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Perfect. Perfect. Perfect. Right. 

So you may have a tension there. Right? They think the pity card is going to win the case, maybe with the jury hypothetically or something. But you have to be careful because if they are representing consumer, it is the consumer's case. But the pity thing, and other principles of the disability rights movement, independent living movement, or disability awareness are critical. So educating lawyer about those principles is key. 

They will use language because they don't know. As Lisa used the term ignorant. Wheelchair bound. Handicapped. All sorts of language you can print out. Just because they don't know. You tell them once or twice and they will remember what the proper language is.

>> MAN: I'm looking for clarification. I don't know how many people watched the news in the last week or so, but there was a gentleman who drove over 6 or 7 police cars with a tractor. 
(Laughter.) 

He happens to be a person with a disability. We referred his family to a lawyer that we worked with in the past and has some understanding of disabilities. 

So at that point we divorce ourselves from the situation. But our ready and willing and able to assist the lawyer should he have questions about the specifics of how the disability may or may not manifest itself. 

But in that case, we're just acting as a referral. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Yeah, there are instances where you simply refer a case out. Someone needs to apply for benefits, someone needs to -- an agreement or will drafted for them, someone needs some type of transaction work done help getting a divorce, things like that. 

But there are going to be issues, the bigger issues, the systemic or advocacy issues that you are working on, may be a research effort, educational effort, and the principles of advocacy that you want to educate them about. That's how you help maintain a positive relationship with them. 

You don't have to proselytize, they have the legal expertise, you have the disability expertise and the marriage that is pretty cool. If they don't have that piece from you, as we say sometimes at Access Living you don't want the lawyer to run you amuck. Ignore the principles of independent living. They don't let us do that at Access Living. 
Go ahead. 

>> WOMAN: We played a role of experts a lot of time. 

>> KEN WALDEN: I'm sorry? 

>> WOMAN: We play the role experts a lot of times. 

>> KEN WALDEN: You use experts? 

>> WOMAN: No. We are the experts. 

>> KEN WALDEN: You might be the experts in the case. You are definitely going to be the experts of disability rights and disability awareness. 

So engrained in these lawyers you are working with, nothing about us without us philosophy. Right? They are moving forward with this stuff, they need to be communicating with you. And you have an obligation to communicate with them. You don't have to call them every day, but there should be a collaborative effort. 

There are going to be instances where you refer a case, but if you are working together with him or her or a group of lawyers, make it collaborative. Educate them. They'll educate you. It will work out nicely. 

If there is a media component, if there is a media component, who should be the spokesperson do you think? Should it be the lawyer? Should it be the CIL? You are working on some collaborative CIL project together. 

>> The CIL. 

>> KEN WALDEN: The CIL. Why? 

>> WOMAN: All philosophies it is the tool and not the face of the struggle. 

>> KEN WALDEN: It is your issue. You are going to be the best spokesperson for it. It is your issue. And it is important for you to have the media role. Okay? In our view.

What are some of the challenges? Some of the challenges of adding a legal component. A legal component to the CIL's work. What are some of the challenges? I have one up. We'll get to that in a little while. What are some of the challenges? What do you think? Anybody? 

Money. Yeah. We'll start with the funding. How do you fund this. Right? Lawyers on staff could be expensive. If you have a -- if you don't -- if you have a pro bono lawyers working on a case then you won't have to spend money. But if they are going to litigate a case, litigation costs a lot of money. And litigation is not easily funded.

If you are working in an area where there are larger or mid sized firms, they might agree to fund the case. To pay upfront the filing fees and all the costs associated with litigation. Deposition costs. Experts. Transcripts. All sorts of things. So developing a model that relies on pro bono legal help and pro bono financial help from the same source might be the model that works for you because lawyers can be expensive. 

You might look for sources of funding. There are grants you can get for legal work, from foundations, from bar associations, and from the government. Again, it is not easy to fund litigation, but it can be done. We've done it at Access Living for quite a while. We have four lawyers full-time on staff and we figured out how to raise money to do it. 

There are legal trust funds. You can get financial support or donations from law firms. If you start developing really good strong relationships with law firms, then you can have your development people or your executive director make the ask and see if they can donate funding to your CIL. 

Attorney's fees. Civil rights cases often involve attorney's fees. So if you can get attorney's fees back to your organization, that's very helpful. 

The way this works is, let's say we're representing on staff, representing our center Access Living in a case, if we prevail in the case, the other side has to pay our attorney's fees. Obviously we're not charging Access Living for the work, but the legal theory is they have to pay what we would have made in the case if we were in private practice. And if you spend hours and hours and hours and hours and hours on a case, this can be considerable money. So that's a good way to raise money, but it just sometimes takes a while with litigation. 

>> MAN: Maybe you can't answer this, but do you have like a ballpark figure on how much it would take a CIL to get started? 

>> KEN WALDEN: To get started in what way?

>> MAN: In securing the services of a lawyer on staff. 

>> KEN WALDEN: On staff? A ballpark? Well, I mean it is going to be different. It is going to depend on what the market would bear in your area. Public interest and legal service organizations generally make less than attorneys at big firms or medium sized firms. 

>> MAN: It is really difficult to plan a strategy if you don't have some kind of a target. 

>> KEN WALDEN: I would say with salary and benefits and maybe a modest litigation budget, for a newer attorney, maybe you are talking 80,000. 840 80 to 100,000. I would say. 

>> MAN: Thank you. 

>> WOMAN: Can you speak to if you have a pro bono attorney, liability insurance.

>> KEN WALDEN: Good question. That's a really good question. We carry malpractice insurance at Access Living for our attorneys. So it is for our staff attorneys and then it applies to any attorneys we work with who are volunteering to work with us. 

You would either have to get malpractice insurance. I have no idea how much that costs. I can't imagine it is too expensive. Or you just rely on the malpractice insurance that the lawyer has. All the lawyers will have malpractice insurance, but you just want to make sure they have it. But it is a very good question. 

So there is a funding challenge. There is the funding challenge. What other challenges might there be?

You've got 1,000 things you want to do. 

>> WOMAN: Sometimes bringing a lawyer into the office peoples can see attorneys by (inaudible).

>> KEN WALDEN: The other side? If they are taking a position on your behalf? 

>> WOMAN: Like if the CIL is bringing in an attorney and they say this is our attorney Mr. Smith, the other side might see that as being adversarial even if the attorney is acting collaboratively. 

>> KEN WALDEN: They might. They might. The flip side of that is, that might be a good thing. Right? 

At Access Living just the existence of lawyers on staff is helpful. Because they know we can bring a lawsuit. 

You might be perceived as hostile in some respects, but I think you can massage that in a way that it doesn't. We often bring lawyers to the table for advocacy efforts where we're not planning to sue unless they don't do what we want. It is a useful tool. 

The reason Access Living developed a legal team years ago is because when the other advocacy efforts fail or don't get the change you need, public education, individual meetings with policy reform leaders -- with policy people, meetings with government, sit-ins, protests, if that stuff doesn't work, if that stuff fails to achieve the reform you want, there ain't nothing left to do unless you can sue. Right? There is nothing you can do. 

So Access Living we developed a legal team to complement these other efforts. I think earlier in the day Amber or Adam talked about our Olmstead cases. We brought 3 Olmstead cases because after years, years of trying to do things without suing, we just said, it is part -- screw it, we have to sue them now. We have done everything we can do and now we have to sue. But we could sue. 

Another couple other challenges, because have I to wrap up. You have 1,000 things you want to do but it is important to develop a niche or a focus. Very important. You have to develop a niche or a focus. What is it you want to do. Do you want to focus on benefits issues? Focus on advocacy with HUD? Focus on legislative initiative that is concentrated on particularly important issue? Develop a focus and a niche. 

At Access Living our niche is discrimination cases. We focus on housing for housing and access to government services programs and activities. That means there is a lot of stuff we don't handle. A lot of calls we don't handle because we have a particular niche. Unless you develop a niche you will have a legal component that tries to do everything and gets swallowed up by everything so develop a focus.

Be patient, that's another challenge. Legal advocacy takes a long time. The 3 Olmstead case that is were described earlier took years to resolve -- well, resolve I use loosely, years to settle. It is going to take years and years for those cases to bear fruit unfortunately. Those are the types of cases where things may move too slowly for our liking and we're going to be working on those cases for a long time. So be patient. But even individual cases can take years. 

And that I think is it. 

Any last questions before I close?

>> AMBER SMOCK: So this is Amber speaking. There was one question that came up earlier in the day that we wanted to raise. I think Darrell has the exact question written down. 

The question came up earlier in the day we were talking about the fair housing amendments act. People I think somebody was asking about is there a certain point at which a landlord is in fact obligated to pay for reasonable accommodations to their building under FHAA. 

Is that the right question? Basically in okay. 

So can you tell us a little bit about your opinion of that? 

>> KEN WALDEN: Sure. Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination and housing against people with disabilities. Passed in 1988. Hopefully all know that. So until 1988 it was perfectly legal to discriminate independence people with disabilities. You didn't want to rent to somebody who was deaf, can't want to rent to somebody who was blind or with epilepsy or a wheelchair you can say, good-bye. In 1988 that changed. The law established a reasonable accommodation law, that says that housing providers have to permit reasonable accommodations or allow reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities in order for them to have an equal opportunity and equal enjoyment of the property. 

Reasonable accommodation is a change to a rule practice policy or procedure. Rule, practice, policy, procedure. 

So for example, the waiver of a no pets fee for someone who uses a support dog. An emotional support dog, seeing eye dog, guide dog, hearing dog. It is a waiver of that policy -- waiver in that policy in instance when a perspective tenant has an animal they use for support. 

Change in the policy. Might be any number changes in policies. That's an accommodation. 

A modification is different. In terms of accommodation, think rules and policies. Then a provision called the reasonable modification and that's structural. That's physical. Think structure, physical. So those are physical examples. That's the installation of grab bars. The widening of doors. The building of a ramp. Walk-in shower. Lowering cabinets. Lowering closet rods. That type of thing. Physical changes. 

Landlords have to permit reasonable modifications. So the law on who pays is as such: For accommodations, changes to policies and practices, generally speaking, the obligation to pay for those, if will is a -- if there is a cost, it falls on the provider as long as the cost is reasonable. Usually changes to policies and procedures the cost is not existent or minimal. Cost is on the provider. Waiving is no pets policy doesn't cost anything. Other accommodations might cost a little bit. Making a parking space, oddly enough, is considered an accommodation, not a modification even approximate it seems a structure. Makes striping out an access aisle, creating accessible spaces, accommodation, landlord, property owner pays for it. 

Modifications in private housing are at the expense of the person with the disability. The expense of the person with the disability. 

So in private housing if Jane Doe wants to install grab bars, if Jane Doe wants to widen the doorway, if Jane Doe wants to lower cabinets or build a ramp, it is on her dime. The landlord has to permit it as long as it is reasonable. The landlord doesn't have to pay for it.

If it is subsidized housing, subsidized, your public housing authority is a project based rental building, obligation to pay moves over to the housing provider, to the government. Then it is the government's responsibility to pay. Under the another law called Section 504 of the rehab act. Does that address it? 

>> AMBER SMOCK: Yeah. I think the question was something like -- I think the small ticket items are understandable. I think the question was just if you wanted to modify an apartment, you found a apartment you wanted to move in and you wanted to do something like make sure the shower is a roll-this shower, going to cost like $4,000 which is a lot of money for most people, does the landlord pick it up. Does the consumer pick it up. Okay, the tenant has to pick it up?

>> KEN WALDEN: Yeah, unless it is subsidized housing. And that is as long as the cost is reasonable, the government housing provider or the manager of subsidized housing would have to pay for that. 

>> WOMAN: Can you speak to something else we talked about this morning? Can the 504 property simply say we can't do that. It is an undue financial burden? What is their responsibility? 

>> KEN WALDEN: They could. And that's an equation. Right? Some folks from the CHA here who would sometimes will argue it is a fundamental alteration. 
If a repair is going to cost $100,000 for a small public housing authority, that's going to probably be fundamental alteration. 

If it is going to be 5 or 10,000, probably not. Depends on the size of the entity, what their budget is, the cost of the improvement, those types of things. There is no black and white rule unfortunately. 

>> WOMAN: Are they required to offer an alternative?

>> KEN WALDEN: Yes. They might offer it transfer the person to another unit that's accessible for example. 

>> MAN: I don't know if you were planning -- oh, sorry. 

For those of us who come from the states who don't really even have a legitimate Olmstead plan, could you talk about how or if it is going to be covered tomorrow that will be great, what you guys were able to do in terms of the DOJ settlements around Olmstead in Illinois and how you went about doing that. 

>> KEN WALDEN: They weren't DOJ settlements. DOJ wasn't involved in our cases. So how are we going to make sure they comply? Is that the question? 

>> MAN: For those of us who haven't been able to make a whole lot of progress around Olmstead, how did you go about being able to achieve what you have been able to do. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Okay. Earlier today, did you have some detail about those cases?

>> MAN: No. 

>> KEN WALDEN: I'll provide a little detail. We had 3 cases. One was -- there were 3 class actions. That means we represented a lot of people. We had small number of representative who were there, our plaintiffs who represented a lot of people. 

One class of people were folks who had physical disabilities living in nursing homes in Cook County. One of our cases. Another case is on behalf of people with psychiatric disabilities living in pardon the name, this is the name, institutes of mental disease they are called. Third class was persons with developmental disabilities living in state institutions. 

Each of those cases were brought by a team of lawyers, because they are big, complicated expensive cases. So the team always consisted of Access Living, Equip for Equality which is the protection advocacy in our state. I mentioned earlier, each state has protection advocacy organization. That's a ready place to go for presenting issues. And then the ACLU. Those 3 actors were in every case. 

Each case recruited a big law firm to join up with. We brought the cases at different times. The idea was kind of to bring this trio of cases to address a number of different classes of people with disabilities, with the focal mission being to promote independent living options for people with disabilities so they wouldn't be forced into institutions to get services. 

We followed those cases against -- filed those cases against state, before trial each case settled. The settlement negotiations took months and months and months. Finally we settled each case. They settled at various stages. Now we're trying to monitor compliance with those settlements to make sure the state does what it promised to do. And that's -- when I referenced earlier that these cases take a long time, these cases are going to take a long time.

Each one has timelines in place for providing -- for getting people out of institutions within a certain amount of time. But we're going to have to monitor this very closely because in a lot of big cases, we struggle with compliance issues on behalf -- with the state it is often issues with compliance. We have to be on them. 

That's the plan. But just knowing what I know from having practiced for a while, these are going to be tough cases that we're going to be working on for years. For years. 

>> AMBER SMOCK: If I could just add a couple pieces, and I know we have to sort of wrap up really soon. And hopefully if you want to talk to Ken, he will be available to talk to. 

But something important to know about the Illinois Olmstead cases is that they came about after disability advocates had tried for 4 or 5 years to work with the State of Illinois just to negotiate based on the 1999 decision. Come to 1999 Olmstead happens and everybody in Illinois is like, oh, great! A Supreme Court decision! Now we can finally force the state to start putting money into community-based services. 

They tried for 4 or 5 years to make that happen. Finally they hit a wall where nothing was going on. Nobody was cooperating. Forget about it. 

So the CEOs for Access Living and Equip for Equality said, okay, screw it. We're going to sue. So what do we need to do to make that happen. So that's basically --

Last year NICL had a training on Olmstead and we told the Illinois story on training. That's how it went down. So people tried and tried and tried. 
Now we're seeing a lot of change because of the settlement agreements, the implementation of the cases, the State of Illinois legislators are like, oh, my God. We have to make sure we fund these things and have a plan and all this stuff because they sued and now it is like a legal thing. That's really important. 

But at the same time, grass roots advocates have been doing direct action, negotiating, pushing the State of Illinois towards not just meeting the Olmstead needs for that group of people, but statewide. Now we're starting to finally see fruit.

That hearing that I went to yesterday morning was part of that. Illinois is slowly starting to kind of come around. It takes a really long time. Takes some pretty kick ass things to make that happen. 

Anyway, I know there were a couple more questions but we have to back up. Is it okay if people ask Ken after the meeting? Is that all right? 

Okay. Let me go ahead and come over to the table. 

>> KEN WALDEN: Thank you everybody. 
(Applause.) 

>> AMBER SMOCK: First of all, I hope everybody is doing okay at the end of this day. I know it has been a long day. People have been going since 8:30 in the morning. I want to thank Ken for the presentation that you just did. Unfortunately as we know Lisa had to leave. I thought Lisa did a really kick butt job of talking about how to engage with HUD, because I think she brought up a couple things I didn't know. I am like, hmm, maybe we should talk to those people. So that was pretty awesome. 

So thank you, Ken, for your presentation and everything. With that, I think -- maybe we should do a gut check. Okay. Remember the gut check this morning? One word. How are you feeling right now? Any volunteers? 

>> Tired. 

>> AMBER SMOCK: Tired? Oh. We should add another workshop or two. Awe. 

Besides tired, give pee some other words. 

>> MAN: Anxious. 

>> AMBER SMOCK: Okay. There is lots of -- give me one more word please. (inaudible) awesome. That's a good word to end the day with.

The word was empowered. Good word? Okay. Okay. 

So I think at this point, do we have any final words? 

>> ADAM BALLARD: So I just wanted to -- part of the gut check we didn't do this morning because we were in a hurry to start the day of the part of the gut check is to ask why. So I'm going to ask why you feel empowered? 

>> WOMAN: Well, there were a lot of points that were raised that made me feel like now I've got another avenue to go to. Especially the had you had presentation. -- HUD presentation. I forgot her name. I thought that was very helpful for me because I deal with HUD a lot but I didn't think of other players within HUD. 

>> ADAM BALLARD: Okay. I think the person who said anxious left so I can't ask him why. Oh, there he is.

>> MAN: Because I'm anxious to ask Ken another question. 
(Laughter.) 

>> ADAM BALLARD: We'll shut up soon so we can ask Ken another question.

Is there housekeeping stuff from either Tim or Darrell? 

>> TIM FUCHS: No. 
(Laughter.) 

>> ADAM BALLARD: Hooray!

>> TIM FUCHS: I just wanted to use the mic. We're going to start around quarter to 9 tomorrow morning. We have the handouts at the door as you all head out so don't forget to get those. 

>> ADAM BALLARD: Don't forget to grab the handouts from Darrell on the way out. We'll be back here tomorrow at quarter to 9.