The Disability Impact Registry

By: Molly Lazarus, Director of Remarkable US

As I have been tracking the news and the posts and asks from the disabled community, it has occurred to me that the chaos of the current administration is providing a buffer for the sometimes slow and sometimes sudden losses that are impacting the disabled community. This scares me. Budgets that are handed down but not allocated, services like Medicaid that are threatened, and budget cuts with little thought to the repercussions all mean that we can’t quite track who is being impacted and how we can help.

I worry each person will feel the impacts differently. We will all know someone affected, but we may not be able to see trends or tap into the greater community to help each other. That is why I have put together this registry. There needs to be a place to learn about these impacts and coalesce support.

Here is my commitment. I will track and anonymously share the impacts, big or small, that our community is dealing with. If there are people that can be directly connected around specific support, I will make those connections.

My hope is that innovators and folks who are looking to build startups and nonprofits in this space will also pay close attention. This will be a place where you can directly see the immediate needs of the disabled community and build for them.

If we can’t count on our government, we must figure out how to count on each other. Outrage only gets us so far.

If you want to help:

• Share this information with your community
• Document your experience
• Sign up for the newsletter, where we will highlight needs
• Reach out to me directly with ideas

Finally, bookmark Accessibility in Action. This is likely not a one-time data collection point but something that is needed over time.