MILC

The MILC, like all Independent Living Centers (ILCs) has the important but unfulfilled Mission of working to ensure that we and our Nation’s more that 45 million fellow people experiencing disabilities are one day able to participate in, and be considered as equals in, all areas and aspects of the American way of life. The fact is that despite major inroads made (i.e. Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act & even the Americans with Disabilities Act itself); passive and overt discrimination which excludes people with disabilities from their participation and enjoyment of many things in this Country—still exists. Our goal: to end that discrimination and exclusion, and ensure that people with disabilities have the opportunity to prove ourselves equal. With that; Independent Living Centers are committed to working everyday at effecting the Systems & Attitudinal Change it will take for people with disabilities to be uniformly treated, considered and viewed as the people that we ultimately are—which is ordinary everyday Americans!

People with disabilities have been long subjected to the medical model of service provision. That medical model casually assumes that professionals working within an organization or agency are somehow more qualified than we are when it comes to making decisions about our lives. The problem with that- beyond just the incredible disrespect it implies- is that it discounts the reality that more often than not, the best judge of a person’s abilities, inabilities, hopes, dreams, aspirations and desires, is the individual themselves. “Nothing about me, without me” has become the disability community’s shout for respect, and its concept that you are in the best position to know what it is that you can do and/or need, is how MILC will interact with you from our first contact on.

Who Do We Serve?
• People with all physical and mental disabilities.
• People with disabilities of all ages.
• Parents, spouses, siblings, and significant others of people with disabilities.
• School personnel
• Business and industry
• Local government agencies
• Human Service organizations
• Volunteer sector organizations, hospitals, health organizations, and the medical community
• Civic organizations

Consumer Control & Operation:
What sets the MILC, Inc. apart from practically all other traditional human service providers out there is our reliance on the experience, input, knowledge and guidance of the people we claim to represent and serve. In other words; MILC is a true Independent Living Center in that by mandate, more than fifty percent of the members of our Board of Directors are people with disabilities themselves. Although not required by statute to do so, we take that concept of the power of the peer experience a bit further by ensuring that the majority of our staff and volunteers working at MILC, Inc. are people with disabilities as well. Ultimately; this “personal experience with, and consequent perspective of what needs to be done when it comes to matters of disability” goes a long way toward explaining the vigor with which we pursue our “job”!