Jennifer Monthie
The article, describes Disability Rights New York’s representation of clients with I/DD in rights restoration proceedings, following the stories of three people, Michael, Junior, and Kelly, who sought the termination of their Article 17A guardianships.
Reprinted with permission from: Health Law Journal, Fall 2018, Vol. 23, No. 2, published by the New York State Bar Association, One Elk Street, Albany, NY 12207.
Kristin Booth Glen
The article describes the 2017 ABA Resolution “urg[ing] courts to consider supported decision-making as a less restrictive alternative to guardianship” and “to consider available decision-making supports that would meet the individual’s needs as grounds for termination of a guardianship and restoration of rights” including how some judges have taken the lead in promoting SDM in their jurisdictions.
Download PDF What Judges Need to Know About Supported Decision-Making, and Why
Arlene S. Kanter & Yotam Tolub
Co-authored by SDMNY Advisory Council member Arlene Kanter, this article recounts advocacy efforts in Israel to implement the CRPD Article 12 right to legal capacity through the use of SDM, and describes other efforts to implement the CRPD around the world.
Leslie Salzman
In this article, SDMNY Advisory Council member Leslie Salzman, argues that “guardianship violates the integration mandate of the ADA and implicates substantive due process in ways that require changes in state guardianship regimes” because guardianship isolates the individual and limits “the individual’s interactions with public and private actors in the community.”
Kristin Booth Glen
This article this article, summarizes the design of the three-phase SDMNY facilitation model for creating supported decision-making (SDM) agreements and the project’s progress to date, and discusses some implications of SDM for health care.
Reprinted with permission from: Health Law Journal, Fall 2018, Vol. 23, No. 2, published by the New York State Bar Association, One Elk Street, Albany, NY 12207.
Jennifer J. Monthie
This article describes a federal law suit brought by Disability Rights New York (“DRNY”), arguing that Article 17-A of the Surrogate’s Court Procedure Act violated the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”), and § 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The case was ultimately dismissed based on the “abstention doctrine” and the federal courts did not reach the merits.
Download PDF The Myth of Liberty and Justice for All: Guardianship in New York State
Eliana Theodorou
In 2015, Texas became the first state in the United States to pass legislation formally recognizing SDMAs. The article looks at the political processes that went into that ground-breaking law, noting particularly issues of guardianship abuse and concerns about the impact of the aging of the population on probate courts in addition to advocates’ emphasis on self-determination.
Kristin Booth Glen
In this article, SDMNY Project Director Kristin Booth Glen discusses guardianship laws as of October 2012, focusing on an examination of mental capacity and legal capacity in regards to an individual’s decision-making process and the legal oversight of incapacitated people. International human rights laws and a disability rights movement are addressed in relation to the legal capacity of an individual. Thomas S. Kuhn’s book “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,” which mentions the phrase paradigm shift, is also assessed, along with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Download PDF Changing Paradigms: Mental Capacity, Legal Capacity, Guardianship, and Beyond (2012)
Kristin Booth Glen
The article considers how the human right of legal capacity, specifically for persons with disabilities, can be incorporated into legal discourse and practice in the United States. Drawing on efforts in Canada, Europe, Africa, and Australia it looks at the ways in which legal capacity and the corresponding practice of supported decision-making (SDM) have been introduced and promoted through legislative reform and pilot projects, concluding with some observations about what it will take to bring this critical human right “home.”
Margaret Wallace
This report provides an independent evaluation of South Australia’s Office of the Public Advocate (OPA) SDM pilot from 2010 to 2012, among the world’s first, which targeted a total of 26 persons with and intellectual disabilities and traumatic brain injuries, detailing benefits to Decision-Makers as well as some of the challenges experienced by Supporters.
Anna Arstein-Kerslake et al.
This article explores the theoretical foundations of supported decision-making and the evolution of supported decision-making research that is emerging in leading jurisdictions, the United States and Australia, and its potential to transform disability services and laws related to decision-making.