Visionary Voices Interview
Peter Polloni
November 28, 2012
Chapter One: Early Life and Career
6:10:11:21 – 6:10:44:14
My name is Lisa Sonneborn, and we’re here on November 28th, 2012, interviewing Peter Polloni. Also
present is our videographer, Bunni Ogunleye and Mr. Polloni do we have your permission to begin our
interview?
You do.
Thank you very much
6:10:44:14 – 6:10:59:17
Q: Mr. Polloni, can you tell me when and where you were born?
A: I was born in Massachusetts in a little bird called Pigeon Cove, just outside of Rockport,
Massachusetts. And years passed.
6:10:59:17 – 6:12:44:25
Q: You’ve spent most of your professional career working on behalf of people with disabilities both in
Pennsylvania and around the country. And I’m wondering, Mr. Polloni was that always the career that
you had envisioned for yourself?
A: No. I started out from high school to undergraduate work at a school called LeTourneau Technical
Institute. It’s LeTourneau University today, in Longview, Texas, and I pursued the course work in
electrical science, gaining my baccalaureate degree in electrical science. And then, uh, from there I went
off and entered seminary, and at first here in Philadelphia, actually, north of Philadelphia, for a year, and
at that institution I met my wife. She was a secretary to the Dean. I met her that year and the following
year we transferred up to Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary in Massachusetts. The Conwell school
came from Temple, it was a merger between Gordon Divinity School and Conwell School of Theology
here at Temple. So that was an interesting merger. And, uh, actually that took place a little later. I
graduated in 1959 from the seminary, it was Gordon Divinity School at that point, and gained my
master’s in Divinity.
6:12:44:25 – 6:15:58:09
Q: Mr. Polloni, I wondered that drew you to your disability work?
A: Actually, after seminary, I was ordained in the Baptist Ministry, and took a church in Wycombe, which
is just outside of Doylestown, Pennsylvania. And uh, small church, and because it was small I had to do
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other things to meet the needs of a family at that time. We had two children as I came out of seminary,
and we, uh, in serving that congregation, there was a young man in the congregation who was severely
developmentally delayed. And so we got acquainted with that family and they brought to my attention
the fact that Bucks County Association for Retarded Children, at that time, were looking for an executive
director, and they had had a bad experience with somebody, and I guess they thought if they hired a
clergyman maybe he would be more honest. But that was my initiation into the field at that time with
the Bucks County Association. And that was in 1960, and subsequent to that, and during that period, I
went over to Delaware County and was kind of oriented into the field of services that Delaware County
was offering at that time. And at the same time, of course, became acquainted with institutional life and
took time to go and visit Pennhurst state school and hospital, and was kind of shocked at what I saw.
Especially in the back wards with the more severely disabled. So that was a penetrating thought at that
time, as we got initiated in the field. But the ARCs at that, at the time in the early ‘60s were kind of
emerging. They kind of emerged in the early ‘50s. They were gathering momentum as parents got
together and were concerned about the lack of services, and the lack of response to their needs. And
the ARC became quite a strong, I would say powerful, volunteer advocate organization during that time
frame. It probably hasn’t maintained that in more recent years. I guess one reason is more service is
made available; the more people are integrated into services, the less concern about the demand for
services. So, it was a pioneering period in the ’50s and ‘60’s. And we were just starting nursery programs
for early education of disabled people in the community and Bucks County had early education
programs in Quakertown and Doylestown and in Bristol. And then they also were starting sheltered
workshops. We had a sheltered workshop in Bristol and in Doylestown. They were formative at that
point, as compared to the rehabilitation programs that exist today.
6:16:11:17 – 6:17:28:12
Q: Mr. Polloni, you talked about - during part of your early ministry, your first church, that you
supported [a family]. The son of the family had significant disabilities. And I wondered if you could tell
me just a little bit more about that family and your interaction with them. Was supporting them an
extension of your ministry in some way?
A: Uh, yes. I was uh, aware of the needs of their son, but he was into a sheltered workshop program at
that time so. The, and that family was an advocating couple, so they were working with other, other
couples and, shakers and movers in the movement at that point and getting things going and so on. And
subsequently there were other disabled young people at the church, a Down Syndrome baby was born
within the church so we had interaction with that family as well. And, as time goes on you have more
and more experiences, of course.
Chapter Two: Work with PARC
6:17:28:12 – 6:22:12:20
Q: You did go on to become the Associate Director of PARC [Pennsylvania Association of Retarded
Citizens], the state organization in 1965 I believe?
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A: That’s correct.
Q: Okay. And two years later you did leave the church, your ministry, to focus of your work with PARC.
And I’m wondering why you did that?
A: Well I had been involved in the state association. Now the Pennsylvania ARC was, gaining momentum,
had very good parental leadership in the organization. Some upstanding people who demonstrated their
leadership, and because of that, and going to state conferences and uh, meetings with executive
directors, it got more orientation to the broader field, at least in Pennsylvania, but then there were the
national ARC were also holding conventions and conferences uh, where we had involvement, I had
involvement at that time, as well. The Bucks County Association was rolling and developing, and because
of those activities, the state executive director was a gentleman by the name of Francis X. Lynch who
subsequently became the director of the Developmental Disabilities Program in Washington. Uh, under
the Johnson administration, I believe. Um, the-- he had requested if I would come on with him to help
direct the state ARC, and uh, the need to expand and develop the state organization at that time. So two
things were going on. One was the major effort coming out of the Eisenhower administration. The
studies on mental health, mental retardation nationally, which focused on community needs and also
focused on the need for state by state legislation to set up network services. And so that was into the
1965-66 period when the state of Pennsylvania adopted its legislation for the Mental Health/Mental
Retardation Act, and developed the network services of county based Philadelphia, Montgomery,
Delaware, Bucks, Chester, and across the state. Uh, some were combinations of counties, but by the
most part were county by county MH/MR service directors and staff. Uh, so that was the beginning of a
much more extensive period. And that period was, of course, formative, beginning. And that’s
developed since then. Since that was 40 years ago. A lot has happened since then. Some good, some not
so good. And of course people dealing with budgets today and uh, federal and state budgets are
concerned about cutbacks in services at this point. But what we have today is so far ahead of what we
had 40 years ago, that uh, maybe it’s not bad for people to realize the privilege of having services and
that it’s not just a right, per se. Um, and in that timeframe of ’65-’67, there was a two year period that I
was at the state association. I had also taken an interim pastorate in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, and
helped that church get further established while I did the state association work. And the second,
important area was the development of uh, county chapters and during that two year period, we
established approximately 20 new chapters county by county. And the methodology there was to go in
the counties to find um, where there might be known individuals who had disabilities and find the
parents and to interact with the special education people and to try to put together a local chapter that
way. And we were fairly successful in that some prospered, significantly, and others were slow in the
development, but it was a period of significant growth for the PARC.
6:22:12:20 – 6:23:36:07
Q: You talked about the influx of legislation, sort of in the late ‘60s, mid to late ‘60s. Um, was the ARC
involved in the development of that legislation or the implementation of that legislation?
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A: Oh yes. Francis Lynch as a spokesperson for the PARC, was very much involved with the legislators. I
had some of that interaction as well. And of course, the parents were integrated into that effort of
development of the legislation and its appropriateness and so on. There was always that tension
between mental health and mental retardation, the psychiatric community and the developmental
community, as to what was most important. It was on the prestige of the psychiatric level of
professionals versus the mundane pedestrian type of people in the community. But the stronger, proved
to be stronger, were the advocates, and became the envy of the mental health field when the activities
um, brought many, many services to the mentally retarded, and of course some of the highlights which
we’ll discuss are the right to education and then the institutionalization.
6:23:36:07 – 6:25:15:20
Q: I’m curious as to why at this particular time in our history there was this influx of legislation. We
know of course we had a Civil Rights movement, other Rights Consciousness Movements, a president
who had a family member with an intellectual disability. Did any of these or other um, other issues sort
of point the field to this direction?
A: Sure. First of all, and the reason I mentioned the Eisenhower administration, it was a post war period
and there were a lot of disabled people, just as there are today, who were, not so much demanding
services but the needs were quite evident. And uh, I think Eisenhower having been a major voice in the
conflicts of Europe and so on, uh, had a significant identity with the Veteran Movement. And that
helped push that need for comprehensive mental health and mental retardation services. It was kind of
a mental health movement, mental retardation piggy backing on it at that initial stage, but I think that
MR and Developmental Disabilities has gained a great position over the years.
6:25:15:20 – 6:26:14:18
A: the Kennedy family, of course, had a great deal of interest in the field of mental retardation. Um, with
their daughter, Rosemary, the senior, Joseph Kennedy, and Rose Kennedy, their daughter, Rosemary,
and being sister to John Kennedy and Robert and the rest of the family, they had a significant interest in
that field. Um, I think that’s all I’ll say about that but, in 1963 because of their interest and so on, there
was a strong push by the National Association for Retarded Citizens and all of its affiliates in the
maternal health field. And the passage of that legislation took place in 1963. I happened to be in
Washington at that time when the signing of that bill, which was kind of exciting at that time.
6:26:14:18 – 6:28:32:01
Q: You had mentioned that as the ARC was growing in Pennsylvania, and you were adding additional
chapters, as many as 20 additional chapters around the state, um, that we saw the emergence of
parents and parent leaders, um, which I think is so interesting. Such an interesting part of our history.
I’m wondering if you can remember or um, share any recollections you might have of some of those
early parent leaders.
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A: Uh, certainly, uh, it was an emerging period in the ‘60s for the ARC. Uh, during that period,
Pennsylvania ARC grew to about 25 thousand individual members of the organization, which is
significant for an organization. And nationally they grew to about 350 thousand members. So that as
strong active advocates, became a significant movement at that time. Again, I would say I think it’s lost a
lot of that impact in more recent years. Not that, not that the organization nationwide and state by state
haven’t maintained strengths and influence. But I think it was much stronger back in that time frame,
because it was pioneering work. People knew they had to pay a price and they did. Gave innumerable
hours to the field in volunteer services and meetings and focus, and came out with significant actions.
We say that the ‘60s were the, were the decade of legislation, and the ‘70s were the decade of litigation.
It was that kind of progression, which makes sense. Once you have laws that define what services should
be, uh, or shall be in the language of legal, uh, then you have some basis to say I’m not being given what
I should be given and there were then the subsequent actions.
6:28:32:01 - 6:30:50:15
Q: I think…back when parents began to assume leaderships roles, um, I think they probably weren’t
always in agreement about how to best support children. I’m assuming some members of ARCs had
children who were in institutions. Some had children who were at home. I wonder if you can tell me
about some of the types of conversations the parents were having and if they were able to resolve those
very different points of view and perspectives.
A: Yeah, I think the dichotomy or the conflict came more in the litigation period in seeking to bring down
in size the institutions at least, if not to eliminate them. And there you had, uh, parents who had had
their children in institutional care for many years. Or others had made recent decisions, but they made a
decision and it wasn’t an easy decision. And so to have a suggestion that once they thought their
problem was at least semi resolved, uh, it became a hardened issue to deal with that somebody was
suggesting that now we’re going to bring down that institution. So I think it’s just natural to understand
that, that dynamic that develops in that atmosphere. And some of it became negative interaction, but I
think on the most part, it became positive in the sense of outcomes, compromise, understanding, uh
and seeing the evidence of what can be done. Uh, it wasn’t always a good experience when you had the
developmental community facility move somebody from an institution and then that, then you had an
expose about that particular facility as to uh, abuse, uh, inadequate care, lack of nutrition, starvation,
those weren’t very happy terms, and those weren’t very happy experiences in that period. So, so you
can see why there was conflict and uh, and not necessarily full agreement on the direction that things
were going.
6:30:50:15 – 6:33:05:01
Q: Um, you had mentioned, um, that you had visited Pennhurst in the sort of early days of your career. I
believe it was at the request of one of the parent advocates, Dennis Haggerty that you had –
A: Yes. Dennis was, of course, affiliated with the Delaware County ARC and uh, and uh, so we got to
know Dennis early. And then when focus began to, I had an early visit with Pennhurst just out of
interest, to see what institution life was. Later, of course, we had a lot more interaction with those who
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were concerned with what was happening in the institution, or the lack thereof. And again, you know,
that wasn’t a challenge to people being inhumane; it was the issue of an institution is an institution is an
institution. That you get into a setting where people are on staff and they give eight hours and it’s an
overwhelming experience so that you don’t necessarily, some maintain high levels of enthusiasm, and
compassion and so on. Others it was a mundane of going and getting your eight hours over, because the
overwhelming nature, not necessarily contributing to good and positive services. So that became, again,
an issue that doesn’t satisfy parents. That it’s just a matter of care taking in the very minimal fashion.
Uh, you know, as some professional had said, one gentleman who came over from the Netherlands said,
“Our cattle get better attention than your people do in institutions.” That was a pretty, that was a pretty
sharp contrast and challenge to us as to what was happening to some people in the institutions. Again,
you can’t make general, broad categories over everything or everybody. But there were things going on
that were very disturbing.
6:33:05:01 – 6:35:26:22
Q: When you completed your tenure as the associate director of PARC, you went back to the
Montgomery County ARC where you served as the executive director, I believe.
A: Right.
Q: Um, would it be fair to say that at the time that you served as executive director, that Pennhurst and
the conditions in institutions were the focus of that chapter?
A: Uh, I would say that, that it was a, Montgomery County ARC, it’s as we know, Montgomery County is
one of the wealthiest counties in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and being a bedroom community
of Philadelphia, had a lot of professional people in its ranks, and uh, as we know, disabilities are no
respecter of persons and so that you have the cross section of people affected by disabilities within their
family. Unfortunately, a dwindling number of people step forward from all ranks to join together and to
be concerned about the community programs as well as the uh, institutional issues. The institutional
issues began to grow as we went through the ‘60s, uh, and kind of um, drew attention of more people.
Certainly the Montgomery County ARC was concerned enough that when we uh, I think the parents
suggested, not so much their executives suggestion, but their suggestion was that we hire a social
worker who be kind of interloper between the institution and the agency uh, to uh, identify what the
issues might be and how they might be addressed. It was about that time that of course, Dennis
[Haggerty] and others were involved and the legal community was sniffing around as well at that point.
And the development of a strategy to deal with, with Pennhurst and in approximately 1969 at the state
convention held in Pittsburg, uh, a resolution was adopted to actively pursue litigation on what to do
with the institution or to seek to close them at that point.
6:35:26:22 – 6:36:39:18
Q: You were talking earlier about how difficult it was for parents to make a decision to send their
children to institutions, which of course it was, it could ever be an easy decision. Um, and yet, there
were other members, other parents who were working to close Pennhurst and transition residents into
6
the community. What was the atmosphere around the ARCs at that time, particularly the meeting
where the resolution to move forward with institutional closure came about?
A: I think, I think at that time, there were very solid citizens so that it wasn’t hard fast that this was, you
know, it was to develop and strategy in relationship to the institutions. Um, but there was a strong
sentiment amongst a number of people that we needed to have at least much smaller institutions or
alternatives to the institutions. So that was laid out there as the points of discussion certainly. But that it
should be examined from a legal standpoint and that we should engage legal counsel to aid and assist in
the, the determination of what that direction might be.
6:36:39:18 – 6:40:47:15
Chapter Three: Right to Education
Q: In 1970 PARC made the decision to pursue access to education as a first step toward closing the
institutions, and I’m wondering if you can tell me about that decision, again, um, was it hard to persuade
people to um, sue the Commonwealth for the right to education?
A: Well, the coming out of that earlier resolution and the involvement of legal individuals, that was the
PILCOP organization and Tom Gilhool and Frank Laski and others, uh, did a study and a review of the
institution and their determination was the best strategy would be to engage the subject of the right to
education because of Brown vs. US having already been established many years before, ’56 or what
have you, that uh, that would be the easiest issue to approach and would be the easiest issue to make a
determination that younger people, if they were provided their services in the community, certainly
didn’t need to be in the institution. Because you have their twin in the community already who can
access or could ultimately access that service. So that was the argument and that was an easy
persuasive argument. I don’t think that threatened as much about the institutionalization. It would
thwart people going into institutions if you had services during the daytime, for parents and give them
alleviation. So that was a very important – I don’t think that was a hard one. And it wasn’t hard for the
commonwealth to deal with it. They just threw their hands up and said, ‘we give up, we’re not gonna
fight this’. It’s you know, the attorney general advised the governor that that wasn’t a, that wasn’t a
winnable situation. So that entered into a situation of, since it was in, it had been filed with a federal
court, that Judge Broderick at that time, designated Dennis Haggerty as the master for implementation
and negotiations and movement toward a more comprehensive service. The argument was there was
nobody, regardless of the level of disability, that cannot be educated in some way, shape, or form. Now
that’s a pretty strong argument because people would point, you know, point to the very small
percentage of somebody with a brain stem uh, that they, that they couldn’t possibly learn. But the
counter argument was, we need to try. And they have as much right to that approach to education and
the compulsory sense as anybody else. So, uh, so the negotiations by the master with the department of
education and all their people, and all the attorneys surrounding the thing, mapped out special
education as it should be developed in Pennsylvania. Certainly one of the vanguards was the
identification of the individual education program that, that all education for the disabled should be
prescriptive. And that it should be following a plan and so on. You know, we really should say that about
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all education for all children. Uh, but it set the tone as to what ideal education should be. Is what are the
abilities of the person, and then lay out a strategy and an educational plan that’s going to develop some
sense of success in relationship to those abilities that the person has. Not focusing on the disabilities but
rather on the abilities, of course.
6:40:47:15 – 6:42:48:04
Q: I’ve always been so amazed by the implementation of the right to education. So much to do in such a
short period of time. Identify children, identify teachers. Bring them together into a school in about 18
months’ time. Can you tell me, Mr. Polloni, did the ARCs play a role in the identification of those children
and um, helping them to make the transition into the public school system?
A: Yeah, absolutely. And of course, the school districts were mandated to carry out an ID program, but
the ARC engaged personnel to develop material and to distribute it broadly across the state to channels
where the school district might not reach. And so we had a people find or a child find program and we
had a director, Edward Harris, who was an educator and who kind of headed the program up and
developed the materials and used the associations and all other affiliated parties to distribute the
materials. So that became more of a coalition because you had every reason to relate to the cerebral
palsy organization, the Easter Seal people and others to be sure that materials were distributed broadly
and so on. I think it was fairly successful and maybe in the, not sure what studies were done to show
objectively what happened but I think it appeared to be fairly successful at that time. You always hear
the stories of somebody who was overlooked or was found to be in their home and the parents just
were ashamed and kept them behind doors, and you know, unless some heroic efforts are made to
enable and help and get that individual out and into the programs, wouldn’t happen.
6:42:48:04 – 6:43:49:21
Q: The Right to Education seems like it was life changing for so many people. Is that fair to say?
A: Absolutely. And as we said, PARC versus Commonwealth is in every textbook in special education
because of the fact that it was significant. It wasn’t the only place. I mean, there, as happens in so many
areas, state by state, the laws are changed, and of course, Pennsylvania became a model. Massachusetts
had already done some significant things in their 167 legislation which provided rights to education as
well. And we had people from Massachusetts and personnel like Gunnar Dybwad who was at Brandeis,
was a person who strongly supported those areas and, uh, he also had served as the national ARC
executive director at one period, many years ago. Yeah.
6:43:49:21 – 6:46:48:27
Q: Did you feel like you were innovating at the time?
A: I certainly felt that it was good to be part of things going on. I mean, I think that the issue in my career
is not that I had any major contribution to make, but that you were at the cutting edge and in the
pioneering movement, and that you were, you were privileged to be there at that time. You know, it’s
the old ‘in the right place at the right time kind’ of issue. Uh, and so, um, many, many people involved.
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Many facets. Internal advocacy within the department of education, you know, in special educations
were not dismayed or fighting against it. They were delighted to have these reinforcements for, for
more programs to meet individual needs and so on. It was at the school district level that you found the
resistance of administrators, of a budget in the county, uh, with that mandate you shall provide and you
shall respond to this individual education program, and it shall be even to the individual in the least
restrictive setting, uh, you know, this was all shall language. So there was resistance at that level of
people who may not have been anti, but certainly were setting up their priorities in relationship to their
budget. And of course, that has increasing become a problem in many, many areas of the country and in
Pennsylvania, is that as budgets shrink, the purse is only so big, and yet there is a mandate there that
you shall the things so the dynamics get touchy at that point, and uh, and that the community in general
when they say, uh, the cost of that program for that child being sent to a specific and special facility, is
costing 70 thousand dollars a year and the regular students cost us 15 thousand a year, you know? How
can we justify this? It gets down to finance and budgets. And those often drive the issues of social justice
and social services and so on. So it’s not a forgotten issue, it’s certainly on the front burner today and it
certainly was back then. The ARC hired a position, of a special educator who we sent out to meet with
parents as they went over their IEP to aid and assist them through that forest to come to some good
resolutions for programs. So that was busy moving all over the state, for sure. But it was early stage, it
was early pioneering stuff and so on. Yep.
6:46:48:27 – 6:47:01:26
Chapter Four: Closure of Pennhurst, Development of Residential Services, Role as Deputy Secretary
6:47:01:26 – 6:53:02:23
Q: So, the Pennsylvania ARC, PARC, certainly considered the right to education the first step toward
closing institutions, or to closing Pennhurst, rather, and in ’74 it did join a class action lawsuit in effort to
close that institution. I’m wondering if you were part of those conversations with counsel or with
anyone involved in the process, in your role at the ARC. And I’m also wondering if you imagined it would
take ten years to actually close Pennhurst?
A: Well, certainly I was enough of a novice not to speculate one way or the other how long things would
take. But knowing the size and immensity of a Pennhurst, and of course it went beyond Pennhurst, once
you got into the system, in the, I forget what the total numbers of people in institutions were back then.
I know there were seven thousand employees in the institutions at that time. Uh, but um, no in 1974,
David Ferleger engaged [Winnie] Halderman and filed a class action suit having enough persons to be
identified to take it as a class action and uh, PARC, and PILCOP being their council entered Amicus in that
case and continued to work throughout that case. They, uh, you know there were the, they were the
active attorneys on the one side who were in agencies or paid situations, but there was a bevy of leading
attorneys in the state, and especially from the Philadelphia community, who did a lot of work pro bono
in the field at that time, and who, which were, was extremely helpful. I believe it was Jack Hegel and
Rick Massilon, the son of a federal judge in the DC district. They assisted us in a number of areas of
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specific cases and one of the things that became very engaging during that time was Polk Center in the
western part of the state, and their use of what they called therapeutic, uh, boxes I guess. But they were
cages. And became very controversial, and took legal action against them to remove those cages and
the superintendent and the staff were very unhappy. They felt that they were very paternalistic to the
population there and that they shouldn’t be challenged, etcetera, unfortunately. Uh, there were parents
who were very angry; there were staff members who were very angry. Pat Clapp was president of PARC
at that time, and some very vicious letters came in. We attempted to help Pat answer some of them.
Some of them we didn’t even bother to show her, because they were too, too violent and inappropriate
and so on. But that’s the nature of people. You never know what’s gonna’ come out. People, some
people can handle things gently and with resolve, and with understanding. Other people just have
nothing but revenge to exercise, and that’s the normal, natural instinct of human kind anyways. Uh, but
you got to get a controlled, those things, of course. Uh, so there were a number of things that became
unpleasant of course, but you had to keep your eyes on the target and what it was we were dealing with
and that was the people who were there [at Polk]. The superintendencey was changed, uh, at Polk.
Subsequent superintendents were there, were much more on the advocacy side, or people who had
identified with the advocates over the years, and so they had a lot of understanding in relationship to, to
the parent expectations, and their own professionalism of what they should be doing in the institution,
as opposed to the old line superintendents of the institution who tended to be older, possibly semiretired psychiatrists. So their approach to the field was not necessarily developmental as opposed to
identifying behavioral, uh, diagnoses or something. And that was not an easy pill to swallow, but I think
it was fortunate that we saw the people who came in subsequently were more on the developmental
educational side of things. Uh, psychologists, etc., who had a better engagement with needs and
restructuring programs with the help of strong advocacy, ‘cause the other side of the coin is that
government is limited in budgets, and they tend to look around where are there priorities and
institutional places tend to get squeezed so that the superintendent wasn’t totally guilty, ‘cause they
had to deal with limited budgets. I know when we first went into Pennhurst, uh, there was kind of some
pride that they were operating at the level of two dollars and 56 cents a day per patient. Now it’s, you
know, 300-400 dollars a day to maintain care in the institutional settings for severely disabled people
and so on. So, quite a contrast.
6:53:02:23 – 6:59:08:06
Q: While this was going on, Pennsylvania became a leader in the field, trying to figure out how to serve
people in the community. Um, can you tell me a little bit about that process and maybe who was
involved in trying to make sure residential services were derived in a way that best served folks?
A: Community service is a, were beginning to develop in various parts of the country, so there were
models that were looked at in Nebraska, Wolf Wolfensberger was one of the individuals who highlighted
the normalization principle and then the need to move more toward normal living experiences in the
community and so on. A number of people came out of the Nebraska program and Mel Knowlton, one
who is well known in Pennsylvania, came to Pennsylvania, to head up the residential thrust. Macomb,
Oakland in Michigan was a community program that was doing some interesting things in developing
residential services. So community residential services were emerging through the ‘60s, so that when we
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got in that litigation period there were models to look at and so on. And Pennsylvania, because it had
litigation, that was a thrust to say, ‘you must do it’ so that they judge in the case was beginning to say,
‘well this is, natural, normal,’ as the case was presented to him as to what should be done. A lot of
negotiation was going on within the courtroom before any final determination. And for that reason, the
department of welfare in Pennsylvania under which the office of mental retardation and the office of
mental health lied under it. That’s why there were deputy secretaries, under the secretary of the
Department of Welfare. Uh, Frank Beal was the Secretary of Welfare, first of all, back in the late ‘70s,
when the implementation was becoming stronger, and that was during Milton Shapp’s administration
from ’76, I guess through ’80. And uh, um, so what the court orders of uh, downsizing, reducing the
overpopulation of institutions, that certainly had to be a first step, is to get within some range of
reasonable size to staff and so on. So there was a mandate and a mandate to the legislator to fund the
community services, which everybody didn’t appreciate, but you had a federal court action behind it.
And you know, the contention was well, a court can’t tell a legislator what to do, but one of the
examples was, I forget which state it was, maybe it was Alabama, the court said, we can’t tell you what
to do, but we can limit you in what you can do. Now maybe you can drop your football program in the
colleges and universities, and provide the services. So all of a sudden, they found the money to provide
the service. That’s kind of example of dynamics of executive versus legislative uh, versus judicial, in the,
in the good system that we have in this country. Still works, although it has ups and downs, for sure.
Um, but, uh, Pennsylvania did have that advantage and much greater push as those things were coming
into play. I had been with the ARC, we were pushing on a lot of fronts and then the deputy secretary
position was, became open, and then they approached me and whether I would come fill that position. I
think it was more the bur in the saddle than it was because I was the highly competent, highly
professional person. But we, you know, we were used to dealing with dynamics and whether I was the
best person for the role or not, we’ll let history judge that over time and certainly some very good
people came behind me. But we, uh, were able to, and the reason I took it at the time was it was a lame
duck administration. Dennis Haggerty said to me, “You’re crazy to take that position at this time.” But I
felt that there was so much going on that there was an advantage of doing it and realizing, you know,
you are burning your bridges, you’re identifying with an administration and if things change, things will
change, and you will change with it. You know? So your bridges are burned. Uh, but it was a good
period. A lot of movement, a lot of development in a lot of counties of residential services, and the
mental health/mental retardation units had the mandate. The money was there for them. Here’s the
money, do it. And some did it extremely effectively, others did it ineffectively and couldn’t even spend
their money because they just didn’t have the wherewithal or the imagination or what have you. But the
models that had been developed here and there were being brought out and certainly the ARC was
promoting that as well, and, uh, so we had a lot of good development, a lot of good providers, but then
a lot of people had to learn a lot of things pretty fast to meet the needs within the community.
6:59:08:06 – 7:01:39:10
Q: You’re very modest about your own role, but I think even you would have to acknowledge that you
had to be pretty brave to take that position of deputy secretary at that time. I believe the secretary who
11
served before you had retired after criticizing the administration on the radio about its handling of
Pennhurst and intuitions.
A: Yeah, that individual was a, was a strong advocate, had come from the advocacy movement and had
taken the role of deputy secretary. Um, and hadn’t learned the issue of loyalty. Which must exist in
structure of government. You can’t have forces working against one another. You can work within it, and
you can do things within, but you have to be diplomatic and so on, and, and uh, you know, he was on
the radio and he criticized the governor’s office, essentially. So, he didn’t come in the next day. You
know, it was that sharp. But when I took the role from the PARC to the position of Deputy Secretary, I
did say to, uh, many of the advocates, you know, “I haven’t lost my advocacy. However, you have to
realize my position is that I have to be responsive to government and the purse strings, and what’s
available, and I can’t push beyond that. I can advocate, plan, but once you’re told no, and the legislature
says no and no, you know, you can’t be out there screaming and hollering. You have to just be working.”
And you know, enough good people in the office of mental retardation working and so on, too. And
again, the litigation portioned off a lot of money to the program, so there was no, no reason for anybody
to complain. There was just hard work and uh, lots of pressure internally. The deputy secretary, the
secretary of welfare and his associate were constantly screaming and hollering. You know, “Why can’t
you get this done faster?” because of course, they wanted the, the performance and the evidence to be
very strong out there. But then there was the reality of capabilities of people up and down the line.
7:01:39:10 – 7:04:21:13
Q: So, what did you think that you could accomplish as Deputy Secretary? What did you hope to
accomplish?
A: Well, some of the areas that we focused on was to reinforce the people who were in the department.
They were civil servants, uh, and many of them, very, very capable. So, you weren’t gonna’ do their
work. You’re gonna’ enable them to do their work effectively. That was the issue. And then we tried to
do a number of things of interaction with the department of education, department of rehabilitation.
The uh, people in the legislator, the justice people, to try to have some interaction going on between
people. Only a certain amount you can do in a prescribed period of time and so on. And then there was
the election and Dick Thornburg won the election and it was going from a democratic leadership to a
republican leadership. As I said, I was a republican and Governor Shapp tapped me on the shoulder and
the issue was the service area, not the politics of the situation. So that didn’t concern me. I knew the
Thornburgs well because of their advocacy in the field, and Ginny Thornburg was an ARC president and
has had a strong commitment to the field, then and subsequent and now. Uh, so, uh, but you knew
your, you know, the bridges were burned and you were identified with an administration and the
transition team was not necessarily the governor. It was his transition team. He made a decision to bring
in a democrat into the secretary of welfare, Helen O’Bannon, who was a very strong leader, and it was a
good political move on his part because of all the issues in the welfare department. And she had a
strong, strong sense of, of, opportunities for women. And so she brought in a number of deputy
secretaries and leadership roles were women. That certainly was a sign of the times as well. So, that’s
12
what happened in uh, Pennsylvania and some good leadership was brought into Pennsylvania and the
Office of Mental Retardation subsequently, too.
7:04:21:13 – 7:06:05:19
Q: Was it strange for you going back to your time as deputy secretary? What was it like for you
personally being on that opposite side knowing what your goals were but yet, kind of being on the
opposite side of that fence in a way?
A: I guess my personality is not to be consumed by things like that. I just heard that uh, a number of the
labor people, unions, had hung my effigy on the steps of the Capitol. So you say so what? But there’s a
lot of emotion going on out there and a lot of people were being threatened in their future
[employment], or even challenging in a very broad sense, you know, everybody being swept with the
same brush, which was not true. You know, as we said, you have people who are, who are hardworking
and committed in the truest sense and you have those who are very passive and indifferent to what
they’re doing and so on and do forth. So, but, um, it just was a lot of emotion going on at that time. And
so we just took it in stride and life goes on and so we just moved along with it. Yep.
7:06:05:19 – 7:10:32:14
Q: Okay, thanks. Mr. Poloni, looking back at your time as deputy secretary, I mean it really was a very
transitional and challenging time. Um, Judge Broderick um, came down very hard on the state to comply
with his orders to close Pennhurst, but really to transition people very quickly into the community. Um,
did you feel that the state had the necessary recourses and infrastructure to implement his orders the
way he wanted, and how did that affect you in your role as deputy secretary?
A: Well, certainly one of the things that, that develops in any given state is the, the approach to delivery
of services. Some states try to be very centralized and operate everything from the state level. Now,
Pennsylvania at that time was operating a regional program so that you had a region, the five counties
of Philadelphia and surrounding counties and then you had the region up in the northeast and you had
the western region and the central region and uh, the southwestern region. Uh, and with those regional
offices being, you had deputy secretaries in each of those offices. So even there you had some
dichotomy between the Deputy Secretary of the Office of Mental Retardation or the Deputy Secretary of
the Office of Mental Health, and your regional deputy secretaries became turf issues in some respect.
Normal. Depends on how you structure things and so on. I didn’t feel any major issues over that, again,
but it wasn’t a battlefield. We were to have a common purpose. The deputy secretaries in the regions
were deputy secretaries of mental health and mental retardation, so they weren’t specific to the one
disability. So in some senses the Deputy Secretary of Mental Health in Harrisburg, Secretary of Mental
Retardation, uh, were strong resources to those offices who need to trust and depend on them. But
them, beyond them, there was the dichotomy between the counties and the regional offices. The
director of the office in Philadelphia felt very powerful being a director of an office in a large city. As the
director in Alleghany County felt very strong because it was the western power. Uh, so the regional
offices had their struggles of working things out with each other. The dynamics that went between
those offices. Uh, but obviously people worked together because there were mandates coming down
13
from one level to the other. And certainly the Secretary of Welfare was committed to the orders of the
Court. So whether it was to the Deputy Secretary of Mental Retardation or whether it was to the Deputy
Secretary in the region, it was to both. And so there was a need to work things out. The Deputy
Secretary of Mental Retardation really was coordinating and organizing the resources of the central
office, so it was, it was the Mel Knowltons working with the residential developers in the regions and in
the counties and their effectiveness to work those things out. So it was a resource relationship as far as I
was concerned. You can’t get into micromanagement in that kind of stuff. Uh, so, um, at least I wasn’t
preoccupied then. Probably was innocent enough, didn’t know what was going on. But, no I think we
had a sense of those kind of things and the people who were in those roles and some of them were
more affected than others. Others had different priorities than others and so some things slowed down
because of personal issues, but by and large, that, that scepter that the judge held was a powerful one.
But the period that I was there were the beginning of a transitional time. And then it continued for quite
some time into the ‘80s before Pennhurst was ultimately, uh, closed, and many of the other institutions
were diminished in size, significantly. Yep.
Chapter Five: Continuation of Ministry and Work Supporting People with Disabilities in Community
7:10:32:14 – 7:15:08:17
Q: After your role as deputy secretary, can you tell me what you did next? Did you stay in Pennsylvania?
A: No, um, it, you know, when you’re, when you burn your bridges and when you don’t plan ahead
early, you do face some transitional issues and uh, so I did have a period of time where I was dealing
with the question, what do I do next? One of those was revisiting the issue of ministry. You know, “Lord,
should I be going back in this particular direction?” That was a very legitimate question. Um, but one of
the things I did, I uh, connected with the Connecticut ARC and they were going through litigation.
PILCOP was involved with them on their Manchester facility which was their large institution and so I
went up there as a consultant for a period of time, engaged with them in some of the issues around the
institutional development and what was happening there. Uh, the interaction with the, the state
director of mental retardation services, since I knew that whole group by that time. Uh, and aiding and
assisting some of the people that the ARC had engaged for the develop community services. So that was
an interim kind of thing. A little unsettling because it wasn’t clear. And a big commute from Harrisburg
to Hartford each week. But then I had been in contact with Ohio and the Ohio Office of Mental
Retardation, which was far but rather than a part of a Department of Welfare, they were a Department
of Mental Retardation. So they had gotten singular attention. And they were looking for a regional, a
deputy director, of the department of mental retardation, and they had an opening in the northeast
section, Akron, Youngstown, [and counties] surrounding Cleveland. Cleveland was a region onto itself,
but we had interaction with them. Uh, two major institutions there Apple Creek Developmental Center,
which is south of Akron and Youngstown developmental center, right outside of Youngstown. The
Youngstown Developmental Center was a newer facility like Woodhaven. Kind of laid out like them, a
small community, a small, smaller buildings and so on. Supposedly more contemporary. Uh, but still an
institution and institutional issues. But good leadership and so, one of the things we did was get a good
number of people out of Apple Creek, a large institution and had them, if they were from the
14
Youngstown community and immediate surround area, get them transferred to that facility. And then
worked on the development of community services for residential services in the community. So we had
a, a lot of people placed in those counties of Summit County, Stark County, Medina County, uh, and
surrounding areas. Columbiana, Ashtabula. Ashtabula is more popular today because Urban Meyers, the
coach of the Ohio State University is from Ashtabula. There you go, a little tidbit. But, uh, that was a
good experience in that area and that was the Rhodes Administration, which was a Republican
administration, so it was a little easier for me to acclimate politically. Uh, but then Dick Celeste, a
democrat came into the governor’s role. A younger governor, he was progressive and played a leading
role. I stuck with them for a while. But they had change of leadership and then I had, I had philosophical
and programmatic issues. With the leadership of the, of the department and so I separated from them.
And on sound basis, and so on.
7:15:47:26 – 7:25:55:14
Q: Um, you moved to the private sector, though, still working on behalf of people with disabilities, and I
wonder if you can tell me a little bit about some of your ventures at that point?
A: Right. And in 1985, of course I was then confronted with looking for something else to do. Uh, and
once again, you know, you look at the various venues and so on and so forth, and ministry came up
again. But that didn’t seem to be the answer I had. I had served, uh, in a large church out it Akron called
Chapel in University Park, and it had about ten thousand members. They had a choir of about 300. And
Lois and I, my wife, were interested in signing in choir, so we joined the choir, but then I became
chaplain of the choir, so you had a congregation of 300 people that you relate to and it was kind of a fun
experience during that time as well. But, separating from the Department of Mental Retardation, I came
in contact with a gentleman who originally was from Ohio. His father was a pastor in Ohio, and he had
gone to Massachusetts and he had developed uh, programs for uh, emotionally disturbed children and
developmentally disabled individuals, and he had a program in Massachusetts in the Boston area and
other parts of Massachusetts. It was kind of an emerging program and starting with a very good
philosophy. The philosophy was to, to engage people in the community who are willing to take an
individual into their home, comply with licensure requirements so that you’re safe and giving adequate
services to the person, and then you know, recruiting such people. Screening them, uh, and taking them
through the process of licensure within the given department in the state. And then, training the person
and putting them in relationship to a social work type where that’s a person who’s trained in psychology
or special education or social work, or whatever. But the training, it’s commensurate with dealing with
people and engaging them and helping them. And that social worker type would have a case load of
eight to ten people. Uh, and would work with them constantly. That was their, the job. To Be in the
home, to be there developing the individual service plan, to anticipate, because the person has these
behaviors, these habits, these activities, anticipate what you do, when you see them arising or what
have you. And, being available at all hours. That if the person’s in distress, they can call that social
worker. So it was very intensive kind of program in addition to the social worker type and case manager
type. You had a recruiter who was constantly recruiting people. So you were moving ahead, getting,
getting people prepared. Uh, and then you built a hierarchy. You have a program director over X number
of social workers, once you get going in your program, and the recruiter in that complex and then
15
another group over here with a program director and so on. And just developing programs like that. One
by one. Uh, so we talked and liked the program, I always had the attitude “smaller is better”, etc., etc, Eleanor Elkin used that phrase constantly. And it is. And some people say, well I couldn’t handle my
individual within my home, how can somebody else do that in their home, and so on? Well,
unfortunately, governments don’t always encourage support service to go into a natural home. You
have to break down and fall apart and go into some other setting before state governments will engage
themselves in that person. Kind of a, unlikely solution, and hopefully in time, people will begin to see the
importance. They are with aging, sending people home healthcare people into homes with the aging, to
enable them to stay in their private homes and so on and so forth. Why that wouldn’t be true in cases of
disabilities is well, in fact, you probably wouldn’t need as much case management in the natural home
as you would in a setting where people are coping anew with the issues. So we agreed to do that in Ohio
so my wife and I gathered around our dining room table and telephone, and started putting out
advertisements and engaging people in the community and working with state government whom we
knew everybody in the system at that point to develop a contract and to sell them on the concept and
so on. And got initial beginnings. I engaged a contract um, fairly rapidly, started placing people in home,
and developing a staff to do that. And fairly quickly moved off the dining room table uh, made these
arrangements and set up an office and so on. And initially I hired my wife to be my secretary and got on
the way and ground out the contracts and so forth. But it wasn’t a long period of time that we had two
or three case managers types, social workers, and engaged a recruiter and a program director and then
expanded that from the Akron area, had offices in Akron and then we developed an office in Cleveland,
developed an office in Youngstown, and before long we had uh, 80 – 100 individuals in place and so on.
And things were moving along enough, then, that we went ahead and engaged a person to be the state
director for a person who had good credentials and abilities to take up that development then and to
further develop that program. And then I associated with the original organization as the National Vice
President for Developmental Services and Marketing, and so we went to South Carolina, established a
program there. You know, you engage people who are in the field. Uh, get them to agree to a little bit a
sweat-equity uh, but then get them into the system and again, having been a deputy secretary, you
know, the head of the program in a state, you know all the state directors. So I knew the director in
South Carolina. ?? that we hired him into the organization as a director of services and he had his
doctorate in the field and a very capable guy. And we then went to Florida and established a program in
Miami area, in Fort Lauderdale, in those areas. And, uh, which met the needs not only of
developmentally disabled but also the emotional disturbed, and so we gained ground in there. Um, I
knew the director of Florida, had him invite me to Tallahassee, he brought all his regional people in and I
had a captive audience to sell them on the concept and so on. And then we were able to proceed and
develop programs there. And we went to Arizona. You know, again, we had some fellow who had been
in Florida transferred to Arizona as the state director, so we followed him and went out and engaged his
people there and uh, and uh, established a program in Arizona. And went into California, developed a
program there. The director of the program in California had originally been the secretary of commerce
under Governor Regan. So, you know, large state, very capable guy, ultimately we hired him into the
national organization. The organization is National Mentor, Inc. And uh, but we developed programs in
California, again, he was gracious enough, well he was director of the MR program to bring me in and
meet with all his regional people up and down the state of California, and so we, we started the
16
programs there. And we went into a number of different states. When we left the organization, I think
we were in probably in 15, 16 states, and had a budget about 220 million, and in these 14 years since I
left them I think they’re in the category of a billion dollar services and are around the country and so on.
Which is significant. Other significance of it, is it’s a four profit program but maintains that sense of
quality and efficiency and so on. So they’re able to do very well and survive very well and provide very
good programs.
7:25:55:14 – 7:28:15:28
Q: And what’s been the benefit for people in those living situations? What, what have been some of the
benefits you’ve found?
A: Yeah, we got, we identified the people who provide the service as mentors. We, we’re strong in our
emphasis to them. We don’t want you to be parents. We want you to bond, we don’t want you to be
parents or parent like or parent surrogate. We want you to be a mentor; we want you to be objective
with the person. We want you to know that there is a plan for this person. You help them to integrate
into the community. You guide them in those areas. Far better to go out to dinner with one person,
rather than having a van pull up with eight people stumbling out and going into a restaurant. It’d
become rather obvious. Whereas you have one person who has some issues, the other people probably
have issues, too, but the one person has significant issues, is less obvious in that kind of a situation. It’s
just one of the elements of the normalization of services in that sense. And we had some very severely
disabled people, uh, involved in eh program. One fellow I recall, had a habit of eating plastic forks and
spoons and so. Did very well in the home, but every once in a while had to take him to the hospital to
extract things from him, which, and I you know, I don’t know the ultimate outcome there. Hopefully
they were ultimately able to overcome that, that issue for him and so on. But some other cases which
were behaviorally were very challenging and yet some very resilient people who worked with them and,
and um, helped them through. Failures? Yeah. You know, you anticipate that some people just aren’t,
find out that this just is beyond them, but your following it close enough and either doing respite and
recruiting ahead so that you see something that maybe fit better and so on. So it has that kind of
dynamic and it had some very healthy aspects of it and so on. But that’s, um, I separated with them in
1998 so it’s been 14 years now that uh, we’ve been doing other things.
7:28:15:28 – 7:30:41:02
Q: Still pretty incredible it started around your dining room table.
A: Yeah. One of the things I mentioned when we talked before is that um, though I had worked in the
field quite a period of time in the early 1980s when we were having grandchildren come into our life, uh,
two of our grandsons are probably what some people define as fragile X. It’s not a deeply definable
thing, but difficulty to deal with abstracts. Maybe some type of autistic resemblence there. Uh, but, um,
they both have developed very great social skills. The one is just loved by people because of is
personality. They both are working, they’re working minimal hours, like 20 hours a week. They have
their SSI. They’re in housing that is Section 8 housing [and each has his own apartment]. But a beautiful
campus. It’s not for disabled people. It’s for the community and there are aging and there are young
17
couples and you know, it’ a great mixed campus loaded with rhododendron bushes all over and very
beautiful in the spring. Uh, very adequate apartments and uh, they do well. And the one, one young
man, they’re 30 and 28 now, but the one young man has his license and owns an uh, uh, Chevrolet SUV.
And the other one is been riding his bike viciously but is close to getting his license. Whether he’ll get a
vehicle or not, I don’t know. But, uh, they’re engaging. They make some stumbles along the way. You
have to realize that they’ll possibly exploitable because, you know, they’re more easily manipulated
than a lot of people are. But pretty savy nonetheless. And the older they get, I think the more savvy they
are. And so on. So they’re doing well and it’s been good to see. So they benefited from a lot of things
that we had something to do with in the past and that’s been gratifying. Yep.
Chapter Six: Life After Retirement, Reflections on Career
7:30:41:02 – 7:31:55:01
Q: Since your retirement, have you returned to your roots in the church. I know you’ve said often you’ve
thought about revisiting there. Have you gone back there?
A: Oh, I’ve been active in church life. Kind of headed up senior ministries dealing with uh, people who
are getting up there. Uh, we have a monthly breakfast for the senior fellowship and have 20 to 30
people come out and, because of the contact I’ve had in the past, I’m able to bring in a wide range of
speakers to them. Some from the spiritual community. But some from the community. You know, the
director of senior services at the local YMCA speaking to seniors of some pretty practical issues and so
on. We’ve had, we have a seminary nearby so we access some of the professors at the seminary to
come and speak to the folks on some unique subjects related to contemporary life today and spiritual
aspects, and so on.
7:31:55:01 – 7:33:07:24
7:33:08:24 – 7:44:59:00
A: In 1999, shortly after we had relocated to Pennsylvania, we came down to be close to our teenage
grandchildren at that time, and to kind of participate in their sporting activities and other things and so
on, since we had been up in Massachusetts years previous, closer to that group, uh, and of course what
happens is they grow up and move out. So, but we’re still close with our son and his wife and the
grandchildren are in various phases of career development. One of the grandsons is at Jefferson
finishing up his program in nursing and we have a granddaughter who completed her education in
Westchester in Special Ed, early education rather, and is teaching in the Philadelphia School District and
we have another grandson who um, graduated from university and is working for the railroad now. The,
uh, interesting direction. And the younger grandson had gotten married and had two children so we
have two great-grands there nearby, so we’re able to enjoy the familial relations here in the local area.
But in 1999, I bumped into a former colleague, a fellow by the name of Joel Landis, who is with, had
been with Indian Creek Organization. As a director for many years and developed many programs in
Montgomery County. He had separated from them, and was interested in starting something else and
uh, he wanted to go into something else, so we bumped into each other at the Post Office and said
what he was doing and wondered if we could get together and do some brainstorming and so on, so we
18
did that. And this was kind of an open door to just get involved and to, to aid and assist this
organization. It ultimately developed into an organization called Peaceful Living. It’s a unique
organization in that it is Mennonite based, and we know, Mennonites are known for their strong service
orientation. If you have a hurricane Sandy or Katrina, one of the peoples that you’ll see on the scene
very early is the Mennonites Services out there to aid and assist. Um, one of the things I strongly urged
Joe, was keep it, keep it Mennonite. Keep our organization Mennonite because it has that kind of
identification and that’s good. I aided and assisted in some formative meeting with some community
leaders and so on and then kind of pulled back a bit, but followed what was going on. Then about four
years ago or so I said to Joe, “I’m willing to serve on you board if you need further support.” And so we
joined the board and a woman by the name of Jane Fedarrao, she’s a nurse, her husband’s a uh, a uh,
doctor at Grandview Hospital. Lovely couple, and she was serving as president, I think she served six
years. She gave her life and soul to activities and you know, developing organizations are always
challenging. But they did a good job and Joe was well connected in the community and had, he’s a
visionary and an idea person so he was always bringing something fresh. You just have to hold people
like that back a little bit to keep it in perspective. And uh, so we became involved there and one of the
things we saw was the need and assisted in bringing on more people on the board who were more uh,
connected with the community in many different ways and so on. But the board had developed and
they number ten at this time, but they’re a good cross-section of the community, and clearly community
leaders that are serving on the board. Uh, what has developed is they are operating a six bed ICF/IDhon
the grounds of Rock Hill community programs in Montgomery County, which is a Mennonite retirement
home, but this [ICF/ID] is on that property. Uh, some of the residents of the home, parents live in the
retirement home. So it’s a good connect there and keeps them connected with each other and so on.
Uh, they’re all pretty significantly uh, challenging in their needs, the six people in that home. Um, it’s a
million dollar home. The Mennonite structure helped to put forward money not given, but loaned, by
reasonable rates so that it can be recovered and so on. So, that’s one facility that was developed.
Another home became available and a community leader donated it to the organization. It had been
built actually to be an ICFMR and he was holding it, potentially for another organization to run, but
wasn’t too pleased with their capabilities and came to Peaceful Living and then donated it to us. So
there are four people living in that home, very lovely home, and they’re very well maintained, the
population is settling in very well, they’re all out in day programs and so on. So, it’s a very nice setting
called Gheyman House. And then there’s a third house that has been opened which is called Shalom
House, and there are four individuals there, four women, who are residing there. Again, significantly
disabled. All going out into programs during the day and so on. So those programs are, are well
developed. Another program that’s gonna’ develop and is operating is a Friendship Program. Kind of in
the style of the church structure but looking for people who will become friends of a person. And there
are 40 relationships in the community. Not all are in residential settings. Some are in home settings, but
it's developing a one on one friendship relationship with people. So there are 40 persons currently in
Relationship currently. Another big factor, which, which, we kind of pushed it from early on was let this
program become something that's identified with congregations throughout the area. To aid and assist
congregations to know how to relate to the disabled population and their parents. 'Cause too many
congregations don't want to be annoyed. Too many congregations are aggravated at the parents for
bringing a person who's gonna’ disrupt into the congregation and so on. So going in and developing
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strategies and helping people to accommodate and to integrate and allowing the disabled population to
be a part of the worship within the church and so on and so on. So this is an ongoing struggle to develop
that program. We've had some good people involved and uh, and some good relationships develop and
we're looking for that to be further developed. Unique because, I think we've all said, well of all places,
churches should be responsive, shouldn't they? And they answer is, not necessarily and some not very
well at all. And how many testimonials you'll have from parents who say, we went to this church but we
were not made welcome and we were in fact almost disinvited. You know? So that's a sad commentary.
The other side is to do something about it and that's what we're trying to do. So that's a third phase
programming. A fourth phase is a program called creative gifts and that's in Montgomery County and
there are 28 people involved in the program at this time. It's doing, uh, creative things in music, creative
things in art. Uh, they're doing artwork and the pieces, they have an artist who's been working with
them with masking tape and paint, and developing some very interesting pieces of art so that they're
selling for 85 to 150 dollars. And they're, uh, giving images and uh, you know, if you have, if you have a
love of art, it's the kind of thing that you might have an interest in purchasing and so on and so forth.
Uh, they uh, deal with um, having some of them go out from the program for said number of hours to
do bed making in nursing homes. Hopefully that could develop into an official engagement at some
point. We don't want it to become a volunteer program. If in fact it can become a vital employable
situation and so on. So it's becoming an exciting kind of program. It's not tremendously large, but
they're dealing with uh, somewhere near three million dollars in programming at this point, so it's uh,
it's not to be sniffed at, but it's growing and developing. We're in the process of developing a program at
Bucks County, probably somewhere in between Doylestown and Chalfont, that area, for creative gifts to
develop in that area. There's high interest there on the part of many parents who want to see
something different and stimulating for their young people. So that, there is a growing number of
people interested in Bucks County to support that. So, so we're getting involved in that and trying to
make some contributions. Trying not to get too involved. I don't want to become president or chairman,
but I'll support in these various areas that uh, that are undertaken. 'Cause at this point my wife and I are
able to do things. We have a place in Cape Cod so we spend the summer on the cape and we do
volunteer work for a missions organization in Florida for a couple of months in the winter time, so takes
us away six months and I don't want to identify with an organization and not be able to give them the
kind of full time support that they engage.
7:44:59:00 – 7:51:12:15
Q. The Right to Education case and the Pennhurst class action suit that we've talked about, quite a bit
today, were really two of the most important catalyst for change in Pennsylvania, maybe arguably in the
country. But how did these cases change you as a person?
A: Well, obviously, uh, and hopefully we all grow through experiences so I trust that that's had a, a
growth element for me in thinking philosophically, etc. Um, I think one of the strongest things is, is to
understand the, the dynamics, group dynamics that the national association for retarded citizens at that
time, was one of the most powerful advocacy organizations is the country, at that time. I think
Pennsylvania ARC at that time was one of the strongest state ARC organizations in the country. One of
the things that we attempted to do, and I was criticized as well as praised for, it was we sent out packets
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of materials out of that central office to every local chapter every week of stuff. Paper clippings, uh,
materials that came from the national organization. Other things of common interest to aid and assist
them in the growth and so on and so forth. So information was an important element in the dynamics of
an organization. And one thing I think that I learned in that period, it in many ways, is similar to a
church. A pastor, a minister in the church is not the all in all of a church. Now hopefully a church is a
body of people, each engaged in service, for their Lord, doing things. A pastor’s there for a guide, he's
there for having been trained to do, and to preach and to do it substantively for his understanding of,
uh, the scriptures of the Hebrew and the Greek and be able to engage that way. But, he's not all in all. In
fact many times he's ushered out the door. But something remains. And in the ARC movement, and in, I
worked strongly with the association of retarded citizens executive directors of the country, the national
association of executive directors. In fact I was chairman elect when I became deputy secretary so I had
to leave that behind. But in that organization, and counseling younger individuals, uh, who were, you
know, peppy and ready to go, was to remind them that you know, you're not the important person. It's
all of these parents who are the power and have the voice and not you. Your role is to put them up front
to engage them in leadership and to become leaders. That's not your role. Nobody wants your name in
lights, you know. They want to know, who is the president? It’s important; they can speak to the
legislator because he's from their district and so on and so forth. Whoever it is, or the national senator
or what have you. Uh, but in many young executives don't know that lesson, and try to build their own
empires and so on. Become something else. Maybe become a service organization with effective
leadership, but it's not very much of an advocate organization at that point. So I think that, and many
organizations, many of the ARCs as you push down the line from the right to education to the
community residential settings, the growth of sheltered workshops and vocational centers and so on
and so forth, for survival, they say well what are we gonna’ do? We have all of these things. And so they
begin the providers of the service, but still try to be the advocate. But when you’re the provider, you’ve
sold you, you’ve sold your soul to the service system. Your effectiveness as an advocate is somewhat
minimal. And Montgomery County was special in that. They were operating preschool programs and uh,
nobody countered and said, we don’t want these children to move on into the school system. You know,
there were early education programs that they could get into now at age four and five, and the need to
let that go and you know, provide an earlier education in your nurseries and so on and so on. Sheltered
workshop, Montgomery County was one of the first leaders to say, it makes sense if we’re to be out of
the business of services to get out of the business. So, in the sheltered workshops uh, we organized a
new organization, new board, and hired an executive director. A fellow who’s good in that and he was in
the Chicago area, we brought him in a set up Developmental Enterprises Corporation, which is a going
organization in Montgomery County and one of the larger and effective organizations there. So we got
out of the business of sheltered workshops. Some of the staff were kind of shaky, but they went with it.
They were then, you know, they were part of the system uh, as it developed and so on. So I think that
was some of the stronger elements and some of the stronger things that were effective and the role
within it to understand your appropriate role in these various activities.
7:51:12:15 – 7:54:32:28
Q. You talked about the reality of budgets, and lack of funding to support people in the community. Do
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you think this says anything this sort of movement back toward institutionalizing people, says anything
about the way our society values people with disabilities?
A: Well, yeah. I think that’s a danger and that’s one of the things that people have to be alert to. Um,
world views, philosophes. There are a lot of people today who think that uh, abortion is the answer to
disabilities. Uh, and yet, you know, we trace back to the Roman Empire and what did they do? They took
the disabled and put them out on the hillside and let them die. Uh, I think abortion is even one step
worse than that. Being a pastor and uh, being a student of the scripture seems to me, it’s called killing,
and uh, I have a very strong view there. But that is the answer to a lot of people to disabilities. If you’re
gonna’ have amniocentesis testing, why do you want to do it? ‘Cause the ultimate thing is, if we see
something there, we’re gonna’ suggest to you that you abort this fetus. Is this fetus a living person? If
they are, how are you gonna’ deal with that consciously and so on and so forth. And secondly is the area
of elderly. We are coming strongly into the venue today in many, many areas in the scientific community
and the behavioral community, and so on, is that uh, let’s not invest too much in the elderly and in new
venues of health if it gets costly and costs too much. Let’s get into a triage and we’ll give more favorable
treatment to those who we consider better possibilities. Now who does that kind of judgment? I think
God does. And uh, but, I don’t think we’re equipped to make those judgments and so on. So, I think that
there are dangers as we move in this direction of uh, you know, let the old die, prematurely if you will,
and let’s kill off the disabled population. Um, the Third Reich was famous for that, and they did that
exactly to the aged and to anybody who was considered uh, disabled. They emptied their institutions via
the gas chambers.
7:54:32:28 – 7:57:07:23
Q: When you’re reflecting on your career, what gives you the most satisfaction? What aspect of your
work do you take the most satisfaction in?
A: I guess, uh, situations like this. Going through an interview and being reflective and, and looking at
things from a historical point since you know, this is dating back 50 and 60 years, to some of you who
are younger, that’s a long period of time. It is to me too. The, uh, the uh, um, but it’s good to reflect. It’s
not good to live in the past, but it’s good to reflect in the historical path of things, and unfortunately in
this country, we have a tendency to rewrite history because we don’t want to emphasize a lot of things
that were true in history. On the other hand, we have some good writers coming forward these days
who are digging deep into history and who are revealing some things that may not be good, but they’re
a part of the history that we need to look at them. So, you know, the reflective mode is helpful and
healthy so long as you don’t live in the past. We need to live in the present and live in reality and uh, if
we believe in things, we need to stand up for them and continue to provoke things positively. There’s
still a lot of inequities out there. There’s still a lot of parents who don’t know the system, who don’t
know where to go, and there are lot of places, the systems are not there to guide them. So I think, you
know, there’s much to be done in many places if there’s somebody who wants to step and get busy and
do it. So, reflection’s good. Uh, reality is good, and hopefully the upcoming generations will be engaging.
A lot of good signs and a lot of statistics and demographics are saying that there are good things
happening amongst the younger generation. A lot of bad stuff we’ve gone through which we regret with
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some of the young people but I think there’s, there’s some turning around. Uh, but I think we as a nation
need to be reflective and I think we need to be reflective spiritually and see where we stand in a lot of
things and what are we embracing and why are we embracing it, and those are good questions to be
asked. Yeah.
7:57:07:23 – 7:58:12:08
Q: Any advice for the next generation of public servants who will be supporting people with disabilities
and families?
A: Yeah, I think uh, you know there’s a lot of areas of need. I saw a statistic the other day that the area
of nursing was so far behind in the preparation of nurses for the oncoming onslaught of baby boomers
and their aging and so on. And uh, that’s true in so many areas of service. What’s reflective of the
attitudes toward the aging will also be reflective about the attitudes toward the disabled. So I don’t
think you can separate them and I think we need people who have value systems who haven’t rejected
the staples of ethics, the staples of morality, that were willing to integrate them into our field of thinking
and service, and we hope that we’ll see more of that.
7:58:12:08 – 7:59:07:22
Q: Thank you.
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