Supporting Independence & Choice ♿

What is a Center for Independent Living and its Mission? 

As a non-residential center of rights and resources for independent living (Center for Independent Living), disABILITY LINK emphasizes consumer control, which means that decisions are made by those who seek out our resources, programs and services. 

This Independent Living (IL) philosophy emphasizes the idea that people with visible and invisible disabilities are the best experts on their own needs. Their personal experience and perspective are deserving of equal opportunity in decisions specific to living, working and taking part in the community, particularly in reference to services that powerfully affect their day-to-day lives and access to independence. 

Medical Model Versus IL Philosophy

In 1972, the first Center for Independent Living was founded by disability activists, led by Ed Roberts, in Berkeley, California. These Centers were created to offer peer support and role modeling, and are run and controlled by persons with disabilities.

According to traditional thought, disabilities are impairments to be cured through medical intervention...as diseases to be cured, and more often, as incapable and undeserving of optimal and self-directed care.  

The significant underestimation of the abilities and life quality of people with disabilities has led to a state in which the evaluation of people with disabilities by medical professionals, so highly valued by society, has come to infringe on basic human and civil rights.

The Independent Living Model sees the problem differently ...

People with disabilities do not see themselves as problems to be solved, and ask only for the same human and civil rights enjoyed by others.  Remarkably, this viewpoint is not generally accepted in society today and the Medical Model is still so deeply ingrained in us as a society that people with disabilities may spend their entire lives in nursing facilities often described as “tortuous” or even be refused treatment at a hospital, and at a professional’s discretion, denied life-saving “futile care”.

Your donations means so very much as we support this IL philosophy and our consumers' self-determination. 

Join alongside us as we embrace choice and full participation in community life!