Advocacy

• Advocacy is about people becoming empowered through training, education and life experience to become advocates in their own lives. (Self-Advocate)
• Advocacy can involve expressing your views about things you are concerned with (disabilities, housing, employment, access to education, etc.)
• Advocacy often is about one's rights, (right to vote, right to access supports, right to live independently, etc.)
• Advocacy helps make change (locally, state, nationally, internationally).
• Advocates are those people who speak up and voice their concerns, express their rights, convey a message for themselves (self-advocates) or for others (advocates).

Many agencies and organizations provide advocacy for individuals with special needs.

Sometimes we need someone else to help us express our concerns, our rights, or our needs. Advocates can help with this. Often they can provide guidance for individuals and their families to access services.

Below are links to agencies and organizations who may provide advocacy or provide avenues for individuals and their families to become involved in advocacy.

 Housing/Independent Living/Assisted Living

• Self Determination Housing Project of Pennsylvania, Inc. (SDHP)
• Provides information and resources that empowers people with disabilities to have control over their housing choices.

 Get Involved in Advocacy and Leadership

• The Pennsylvania Developmental Disabilities Council
• "The Pennsylvania Developmental Disabilities Council is a group made up of people with disabilities, family members, advocates, and state department representatives who work to create favorable conditions for people with developmental disabilities and their families in the Commonwealth."

Mental Health Resources

• Pennsylvania Mental Health Consumer's Association
• (PMHCA) provides information, referrals and supports to people who are receiving services or in recovery from a mental illness in Pennsylvania.
• Pennsylvania Mental Health Consumers' Association
  4105 Derry Street | Harrisburg, PA 17111
  717-564-4930 or 1-800-88PMHCA(76422) 
• The National Alliance on Mental Illness
• "At the heart of NAMI's mission is our grassroots and the sharing of information
  with people with mental illness, their families, friends, mental health
  professionals, and the general public. NAMI strives to offer hope, reform and
  health to our American community through support, education , and advocacy
  efforts."