June
Isaacson Kailes (http://www.jik.com)
has a Disability
Policy Consulting practice and is the Associate Director of
the Harris
Family Center
for Disability and Health Policy at Western
University of Health Sciences, Pomona, California. June’s
consulting and publications focus on building disability
actionable competencies in the worlds of health care and emergency
management
to ensure people with disabilities and others with access and
functional needs
are integrated and included in service delivery processes, procedures,
protocols, policies and training.
June
is one of just a handful of people with disabilities who
focused on disability related emergency issues decades
before Hurricane
Katrina. As far back as the 1970s and
80s, June documented the deep and dramatic lack of equal and
inclusionary
emergency services for people with disabilities.
June
has over four
decades of emergency experience and works internationally, as well as
with
local, state, and federal governments, and with community-based
organizations.
Her breadth and depth of experience in access and functional needs and
her work
as a writer, trainer, researcher, policy analyst, advocate, subject
matter
expert and expert witness is widely known and respected. She has
the
unique ability to blend and bridge two worlds: disability lived
experiences and
emergency management experience.
In
the emergency management
world, June is a pioneer, leader and innovator. Seven examples of her
impact
and influence include:
1.
1.
Researching
and writing “Southern
California Wildfires After Action Report
” for California
Foundation for Independent Living Centers, one of the first After
Action Reports (AAR) to
incorporate a civil rights and disability related functional needs
perspective.
This effort was motivated by the finding that most AARs are scrubbed,
homogenized and sugar-coated political documents that are silent or at
best
make only cursory reference to the disproportional impact on people
with access
and functional needs related to maintaining their health, independence
and
safety.
This
AAR is widely used and cited. It details what worked, didn’t work and
needs works
and makes 71 recommendations serving as a roadmap
for future
lessons to apply. Areas
covered include:
·
cross
cutting
issues,
·
communication
access,
·
mass care
and shelter,
·
evacuation
and
transportation,
·
role of
nongovernmental provider and advocacy
organizations in disaster response,
·
long-term
care facilities,
·
training
and exercise programs.
CMIST
offers clarity, precision, and specificity for building competencies to
inclusive planning and service practices. Emergency plans based on
optimizing
function rather than “specialness” increases the chance of successful
accommodation of predictable needs.In emergencies, people with disabilities continue
to lose
their health, their independence and sometimes their lives. This is
because
over decades, information transfer regarding these predictable needs,
and
lessons observed, relayed, and documented, are not integrated into
plans,
policies, procedures, training, and exercises. June’s work focuses on
consistently and repeatedly applying these lessons so that they can be
eventually
claimed as lessons learned.
4.
5.
Originating and working
with the State of California to adopt and implement the use of Functional
Assessment Service Teams (FAST).
These
teams strategically link government, nonprofit and business sectors
to work with individuals with access and functional needs to
enable people
to maintain mobility, health, safety, independence, during and
after
emergencies. Teams
blend the competencies and skill sets of governments
with those of community disability services and help to retool
interventions
that reflected old, but still common, stigmatizing biases, stereotypes
and
beliefs about people with disabilities. Versions
of this model are being put into practice in California
and other states and counties.
5.
6.
Documenting the critical need to accurately evaluate
the use of emergency
registries
in order to avoid symbolic
planning (i.e.
planning
which cannot be fully operationalized to achieve even the most
well-intentioned
objectives) and think through the implications of using a registry as
the sole
or primary answer to addressing access and functional needs in
emergencies.
June
publishes extensively and some of her frequently used and cited
publications
include:
Planning
and response:
Preparedness:
As
a critical thinker and lifelong learner, she never hesitates to
critic and revise her prior work. June believes the emergency sector’s
performance depends on resilience and flexibility to evolve as
economic,
learning, technology, legal and social landscapes change.
Available on
request
jik@pacbell.net
© 1998 - 2018 June Isaacson
Kailes, Disability Policy Consultant, All Rights Reserved.
Created 11/8/97
| Updated 02.24.18