Advocacy Day for Access & Independence 2022

Burnt orange illustration of an open lock with the state of South Carolina as the keyhole followed by large orange text that reads, 'Advocacy Day for Access & Independence'

Advocacy Day for Access & Independence · April 13, 2022
10 AM - 12 PM
SC Statehouse & LIVESTREAM
This year's event is planned with hybrid options, where you can participate in-person or online. Participate with us at the Statehouse, or anywhere in the world via our livestream online!

Advocacy Day for Access & Independence is the ONLY event in South Carolina that's breaking down barriers for ALL South Carolinians with disabilities. Since its inaugural gathering in May 2014, support has grown to 30 organizations statewide all unified in an effort to ensure people with disabilities have equal access and opportunity. People with disabilities face unnecessary and discriminatory barriers to transportation, employment, and public access. Advocacy Day for Access and Independence will shine a light on these barriers in hopes of improving the lives of all South Carolinians.

Please register to receive notifications about the event and a link to join the Livestream on the day of the event. Please note, when completing the registration, to move to the next page you will need to select "summary".

Official Livestream- Follow this link to our YouTube Channel. On the day of the event, from 10 am to 12pm, our Livestream will appear at the top of the channel page!

Issue Areas

Employment
The State of South Carolina should be a model employer for people with and without disabilities! People with disabilities are two times more likely to experience job loss and unemployment than those without disabilities. Additionally, nearly 1,000 South Carolinians with disabilities are limited to settings where they may make less than one dollar per hour!

People with disabilities deserve access to the same jobs and wages as non-disabled people.
People with disabilities have the right to accommodations that enable them to hold jobs that suit their strengths and interests.

Transportation

Transportation is the key to independence and community participation. People with disabilities are twice as likely not to have dependable transportation. This makes it difficult to:

Find and keep their jobs
Take care of their health needs
Build friendships, relationships, and family connections
Take part in community activities and local economy

White illustration of the outline of a house keychain with a key attached.

Housing
Housing is key to independence. People with disabilities deserve access to affordable, accessible housing, in accessible neighborhoods, with neighbors who are non-disabled. Accessible means something is usable by everyone.

Black and white illustration of a woman wearing a blazer

ADA Coordinators
The Americans with Disabilities Act became law nearly 32 years ago. Yet, South Carolina still has a long way to go to follow the law. The state has faced ADA lawsuits and Department of Justice complaints. South Carolina needs to take action to protect the rights of children and adults with disabilities.

Learn more about the issue areas

How will a hybrid event work?

You have the power to choose how you wish to participate. Come and engage with us at our Statehouse speeches and events, or join the Livestream virtually through YouTube, where participants can watch, leave comments, and start live conversations. State legislators and officials as well as activists from the disability community will be speaking about the barriers that South Carolinians with disabilities regularly face and the ways we can fix them. Both in-person and online viewers will be walked through the process of contacting their representatives about the issues that matter to them, and they will be provided with powerful tools to make collective action easier than ever before.

What about accessibility?

As always, the SC Access & Independence Network is committed to making all of our programming fully accessible for all people, with and without disabilities. Our in-person and online gatherings will be a model of online accessibility and accommodations. CART live-captioning services and American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters will be available to all viewers throughout the event. Should anyone have any additional accommodations requests or concerns, we encourage them to contact us by calling 803.779.5121 or emailing advocacy@able-sc.org. Thanks to new innovations in technology, we are able to connect easier than ever with one another online. This is especially important for people with disabilities, who have access to virtual spaces, conversations, and opportunities like never before. We hope that through this hybrid event and the many others happening during this time, people’s perspectives begin to shift about what accessibility and accommodations look like. They benefit everyone and are much easier to use than one might think. To stay tuned, follow our SC Access and Independence Network and Able South Carolina Facebook pages.