From the New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services:At the spirited Disability Pride and Power pre-Inaugural ball (Jan. 18), it was announced that Kareem Dale would become a Special Advisor to President Obama on disability issues.
We heard later that noted expert in Disability Studies Paul Steven Miller would be playing a role in helping the Obama Administration to ensure that people with disabilities will be well represented in positions within the Administration.
Tony Coelho, former United States congressman from California, primary author and sponsor of the Americans with Disabilities Act, current chair of the Epilepsy Foundation's national board of directors and a lead organizer of the Ball is also playing an active role in advancing disability interests and hires within the Administration.
Finally, note that the new Chief of Staff to the Assistant to the President for Intergovernmental Relations and Public Liaison Michael Strautmanis is known to be very sensitive to disability issues, as referenced in a Washington Post Op Ed he authored last year.
Kareem Dale is founder and chief executive officer of The Dale Law Group (DLG) in Chicago and served as the Obama campaign’s Disability Vote Director. Dale, partially blind, tried to broaden the campaign’s reach and involve even more voices in the Obama campaign.
Prior to his appointment as Disability Vote Director, Dale also served as a volunteer on the Disability Policy and the Arts Policy Committees for the Obama For America campaign.Dale is a native Chicagoan and received his bachelor’s degree in Advertising from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He graduated Cum Laude with a law degree and an MBA from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in May, 1999.
He is the Henry M. Jackson Professor of Law and Director of the University of Washington Disability Studies Program. An internationally renowned expert in disability and employment discrimination law, Professor Miller joined the faculty in 2004, after spending twelve years in public service in Washington, DC.
He was one of the longest serving commissioners of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal agency which enforces employment discrimination laws. While at the EEOC, Professor Miller spearheaded the development of the agency's successful mediation program. He has also served as the White House liaison to the disability community and as Deputy Director of the U.S. Office of Consumer Affairs.
Prior to joining the U.S. government, Professor Miller was the director of litigation for the Western Law Center for Disability Rights (now the Disability Law Center) and taught at the law schools of Loyola University and UCLA. He began his career as a litigation associate at a Los Angeles law firm.
Since 2006, Professor Miller has been the director of the University of Washington's Disability Studies Program, an interdisciplinary program that examines the social, cultural, historical and personal experience of disability. He is also a member of the UW Graduate School faculty, a Faculty Associate of the UW Harry Bridges Center for Labor Studies, and a faculty advisor to the UW School of Law Health Law Concentration Track.
Professor Miller currently serves as a member of the board of Mental Disability Rights International, an international human rights NGO; a member of the National Advisory Board of the Center for Genetic Research, Ethics, and Law at Case Western Reserve University; the Medical Ethics Committee of Seattle Children's Hospital; a member of the Grants and Community Leadership Committee of The Seattle Foundation; and an International Associate of the Employers' Forum on Disability based in London, England. He also serves as an appointed member of the HHS Secretary's Advisory Committee on Genetics Health and Society.Professor Miller is an active member of the American Bar Association's (ABA) Labor and Employment Section, and he is a Fellow of the ABA Foundation. He was also elected to be a Fellow in the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers. Professor Miller is a Fellow of the British American Project. In 2003, Professor Miller received an honorary Doctor of Laws from CUNY Law School. He is a former trustee of the University of Pennsylvania.
