Tuesday, May 13, 2008

ASAN Sponsors Presidential Forum on Disability Issues

The Autistic Self Advocacy Network is a supporting co-sponsor of the National Forum on Disability Issues, to be held at Veterans Memorial in Columbus, Ohio, on July 26, 2008. This event is a nonpartisan forum on national disability policy. The presidential candidates have been invited to discuss their views on the future of disability policy in America. Members of the audience will be allowed to ask questions through a moderator.

A similar forum that was held in New Hampshire in November made history as the first presidential candidates' forum on disability issues. Seven candidates participated in that forum, five of them in person.

ASAN expresses its gratitude to Estée Klar-Wolfond of The Autism Acceptance Project for her generous assistance.

2 comments:

codeman38 said...

Will there be an opportunity for non-attendees to submit questions to potentially be asked at the forum?

asansouthwestohio said...

Anne Sommers provided this answer:

We have not yet decided upon the process we’ll use for questions. In New Hampshire, we had a premade list of questions we focused on but we also fielded questions from the audience throughout the day. For this forum, because of the size of the venue and the arrangement, we’re not yet sure how we’ll be proceeding. We will work hard to make sure the questions that do get asked are broad-based, reflect the priorities of the disability rights movement, and don’t telescope a particular answer as the desired answer. If we open up question-asking to the general public in some form or fashion, we will most certainly make folks aware of that over JFA email.