Last updated on November 26, 2023
Podcast 0011; Season 01, Episode 11 May 29, 2018
PA House Rep. Dan Miller has been an advocate for children and adults with disabilities for many years. In this episode of The Autistic Me Podcast we discuss how Rep. Miller works to help our communities. He also offers advice on how to reach out to our elected officials.
Rep. Miller’s website is: http://www.pahouse.com/Miller/
Transcript (lightly edited)
Scott: Hello and welcome to The Autistic Me. I’m Christopher Scott Wyatt and today for the podcast, we are being joined by PA State Representative Dan Miller, outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Rep. Miller, would you explain which region of Allegheny County you represent?
PA Rep. Miller: Sure, and good afternoon. I represent the 42nd District of the Commonwealth here. We are based in Mount Lebanon, but we also include the communities of Dormont, Castle Shannon, Baldwin Township, a little bit of the city of Pittsburgh, and Brookline, and a little bit of Scott.
Scott: (00:31) You cover an area which might be called a suburb of central Pittsburgh.
PA Rep. Miller: We are overwhelmingly a suburban district.
Scott: You have a very passionate outlook on individuals with disabilities and how local and state governments can help those individuals.
PA Rep. Miller: You know, we’ve been lucky over my roughly five years in office to form a coalition of government staff and employees and so forth, nonprofits, but also, families throughout the area to help sort of advance and bring a spotlight to several issues broadly relating to the disability community.
Scott: (01:02 ) And how did you get involved in advocating for legislation and resolutions that support the disability community?
PA Rep. Miller: I always knew that when I was elected in a special election in 2013 and on the campaign trail, I often talked about my concern regarding what I was seeing to be a part of lack of focus from the state in relation to disability and mental health issues. So I always knew that it’d be something that we would get into. I asked to be on some committees that relate to this area. So we always anticipated it. However, what we didn’t really get was how deep the need and the concern and the issues are and so it has definitely become… has maintained to be… our number one issue and concern that we talk about.
I would definitely say that the vast majority of legislation I draft and work that we spend as a state rep has been in the disability and mental health arena. We always knew it would be there. But now we know we can’t leave.
Scott: (02:02 ) One of the things that I have encountered as a parent and as an activist is resistance at at the state and local level, which is responsible for most funding and most implementation of federal mandates. A hesitancy to follow those dictates or at least the spirit of law and instead they’ll adhere to the letter of the law and even sometimes possibly skirt that? How can the state better implement some of the dictates from the federal courts and also federal legislation. How can we better serve our local communities?
PA Rep. Miller: You know, I’ve been very optimistic and thankful for several of Governor Wolf’s efforts in this arena. So much is, as you said, is tied to some federal restraints and federal dictates, many of which are good. The reality of it is, though, too, in order for most of these things to work, we need to have secured funding in place. That continues to be a problem in every aspect of this, whether it’s talking to 13,000 people on an ID waiting list or whether it’s talking to several hundred Pennsylvanians who are Deaf-Blind.
The reality of it is is that we have some very nice ideas on paper, but we are still struggling to marshall the resources that it takes to bring those good ideas to fruition.
Scott: (03:24) One of the things I noticed in Pennsylvania and other states where I have done work as a consultant is that they are reliant on local funding which causes disparities because when you rely on local tax bases, the areas that need the most supports have the smallest tax base.
PA Rep. Miller: There’s a case actually that I’m trying to keep an eye on now that’s going through the court that is not solely focused on special education, but its just education in general. Unlike the Federal Constitution, our state constitution here in Pennsylvania does have pretty clear requirements as to what the state’s responsibility is in making sure we have an appropriate public education system here.
We all realize that there is some degree of discrepancy between our school districts no matter what. Okay, so everybody accepts that to a degree of truth. And whether or not it should be or whether or not the gap is gotten too big, those are of course real questions for people talk about. The problem is that when you have gaps in funding, especially for populations that have atypical challenges, those gaps are magnified and that very much is where special education, as I’m sure you know, falls into. You know, you could take a child —we have several grade school districts in my area here, Mt. Lebanon being one of them, but you could take a child to Mt. Lebanon, with a certain diagnosis and be able to walk out the door in 20 minutes with a, b, and c in relation to supports. But you take that same child, the same supportive documentation, and go to other areas of Western PA and you can’t get “a” because it doesn’t exist.
Scott: (05:00) And when you take a look at how the state of Pennsylvania does funding, which is similar to the majority of states, schools and sometimes healthcare districts are funded off the local property taxes and that is in effect a magnifier of the disparity.
PA Rep. Miller: And that’s where state funding is supposed to help as well. So, yes, there’s no doubt that we have different tax bases across our state. Pennsylvania with 12.7 mllion, incredible geographic diversity as well to deal with… there’s no doubt that we have discrepancies in property values.
But again, that’s where Governor Wolf in particular has been trying to push with this new basic education funding formula. The problem is in some of the changes we have done for basic and special education those I would say more positive equitable changes are only applicable to new money going into the system. So we’re still based off what, in my opinion, had been for the previous administration, a poor plan in relation to education funding which had led to great discrepancies across the board.
Scott: (06:09) One of the challenges that I see is offsetting the lack of funding at the state level or the local level with charities. You have brought together a Disability Summit on an annual basis. It has attracted a number of special needs service providers, training centers, and others. Could you talk about how you decided to do this Disability Summit and it’s very successful history here in the Greater Pittsburgh region?
PA Rep. Miller: Sure. I went to a forum not… well, I guess maybe 10 years ago or a little bit more now, in Penn State. Very nice and informative. And I took a look at the event. While it was great, I noticed a couple things for it. One is, of course, it’s in Penn State, which can be challenging for many people. This included… cost included, child care arrangements and so forth. And I said, “You know, we need to do something better. We need to bring something like this home.”
So when the opportunity came up — and my office, in particular, we pride ourselves in doing a myriad of event every year — but I said, “Let’s create this Disability Summit here.Let’s be sure to do it in a way that keeps it local, keeps it free, keeps it open to everyone.”
So we worked off of that sort of initial direction. Our first summit was maybe six or seven hours long. Nice event, and we had a couple hundred people, there were maybe 200 people. Two years ago, which was our biggest summit, we had three days worth of events, 1300 people at it, and it got so overwhelming that my staff… we couldn’t keep up with it. So, we’re back to our typical now two-day format, which is what we just completed this year. Somewhere a little bit shy of a thousand people over the two days walked into the facility. And yes, we pride ourselves as well in offering what I think is the largest collection of disability resources in Western PA.
And this, to me, demonstrates that government and private organizations can collaborate to inform parents and support providers of what’s available and their rights. Six months, roughly, before the summit which is in every March, maybe eight months before the summit, we start our planning committee meetings and at that table if you were to come you’d find local school directors school district personnel, you would find nonprofits, you’d find hospitals, you’d find parents, and you’d find self-advocates. And what we do for roughly six months is we plan new topics, new sessions that we bring up.
Obviously there are some topics that are pretty universal. We try to cater to both those who are new to a diagnosis and those who have lived through 20 years and are concerned perhaps about “what comes next” type of things.
We do we put together everybody equal at a table. And for six months, we debate topics and come up with experts on on each one.
Scott: (09:10) I notice that your legislative push often reflects some of the content in current and past disability summits. Do you leave those summits then with ideas that you want to take to the state house?
PA Rep. Miller: One way or another, the summit’s are used to either generate new ideas or the summit is a way for us to showcase current ones. For example, this past summit we used… We do a legislative panel that always closes out the event. Very proud of it. It’s always a great time. I have a dozen or so legislators, elected officials, Democrats, Republicans, state senators, Representatives — Congressman Lamb, you know, for example, was there. So, wide, wide diversity at the at the panel.
We spent an hour talking about Deaf-Blind issues. This was an issue that we were aware of beforehand, before the summit. We have met with Deaf-Blind Pennsylvanians and some advocates. We had the framework for where we wanted to go and then we used the summit to further educate ourselves. But also, to provide an opportunity for other elected officials to become familiar with the issue so that way when we brought the bill, which we did last month, to Harrisburg and to the committee, there was already among some a basic understanding of what our legislation was attempting to do and why.
So yes the summits one way or the other, every cycle, every year, does inform us and help us in advancing or, at least, trying to advance, legislation.
Scott: (10:45) I’d like to shift gears slightly. One of the things that has interested me is possible legal reforms for individuals with disabilities who are stuck in the legal system. You have been involved in reforming some of the legal system treatment of juveniles, especially who make mistakes and might need alternative approaches instead of just a conviction in a jail sentence.
PA Rep. Miller: There’ve been a variety of of things that we’ve been active on a bit with that. I, in a past life, was a Juvenile Public Defender here in Allegheny County. I have a pretty good knowledge of the system — what works and sometimes what doesn’t work. Obviously, particularly for the points of this discussion here, we are aware of the amount of kids who are getting brought into the system with a diagnosis of some type and the unique challenges that that often brings, where some of the bottlenecks of the system are in helping to address, the child’s needs in a positive way. I still largely am very conerned that our juvenile systems, despite the efforts of some very good judges, some very good District Attorneys and public defenders, in particular, do not have the resources available to always do what can be done. And on the other side of that as well, kids with disabilities and mental health issues are disproportionately in the Juvenile Justice System, and that is a whole other set of problems that we need to talk about… especially as we look to increase the number of police who are in schools.
Scott: (12:28) So we have an issue where disabilities often lead to children in the foster care system. Sometimes there can be mental health issues, sometimes it can be abuse issues and neglect. But obviously a young teenager with special needs is a vulnerable individual entering a system that’s an extremely complex system. How do we start explaining to judges mental health in juvenile needs when a lot of people don’t think about mental health and mental disabilities among the juvenile population.
PA Rep. Miller: I have known many Kids Voice attorneys and some great ones as well. Obviously here in Allegheny County we’re much larger than most counties. We have several judges who are assigned to both delinquency and dependency issues here and there is a certain expertise that comes both from their side but also with certain DAs and PDs and so forth — Kids Voice attorneys who are assigned to that population in particular.
Yeah. I still think that we’re struggling — you mentioned mental health — we are struggling, I think, on the mental health side to still wrap our hands around what in essence would be an early intervention initiative a program for mental health.
And what I mean is nowadays if you have a child born with autism basically, especially here in Pennsylvania, but almost everywhere that I’m aware of, the chances are by between 18 and 36 months your child is going to be diagnosed to some degree and be offered some degree of services. And again, I recognize not every state is the same. But here in Pennsylvania that is going to be the case. So we have seen that early intervention in relation to some disabilities have clear, measurable, sustainable benefits. We still struggle on the mental health side with that.
You know, we have a bill for example, that would [adress that]. Right now, if you have a child in the state of Pennsylvania, your child is going to go to school and during their time they’re going to get a vision and hearing, a scoliosis [screening], a physical — all these types of medical checks in relation to their physical health. But there is nothing that even asks a question regarding a child’s mental health. So what has become pretty standardized partially from one of the successes of the Affordable Care Act has been to, was to push in mental health services. But in relation to depression screens right now, we know that half of lifetime mental illnesseses can be diagnosed by the time you’re 14 years old. And we know that depression screens can be a very valuable tool even at a young age in sort of red flagging some issues.
So we have a bill, and that [bill] would say that as of sixth grade, for sixth grade and 11th grade, when you go to bring your child to the physical, one of the questions you will be asked by your pediatrician would be, “Do you want to have, do you want your child to have, a depression screen?” And obviously that will start a conversation as to its value and hopefully why it’s important for all children to do so. The point about a bill like this is we want to get ahead of the curve. We want to identify issues. And again, mental health — undiagnosed and untreated mental health issues — raises a whole variety of problems. So we want to get ahead of the curve for it and hopefully in a way, too, that is sort of erasing stigma that attaches.
It does us… I would much rather look to help a child. If you have a child, would you rather miss the fact that your kid had a cavity for 18 months in the back molar and you didn’t know it or would you rather miss the fact that your kid had a depressive episode and could not get out of it for 18 months and you didn’t know it? I think most people would go with the idea that we have to do better with mental health.
Scott: Is there a personal connection to these issues for you or have you just met enough constituents and individuals that you feel obligated as a member of the community to speak out?
PA Rep. Miller: You know, I think every family, especially in relation to mental health, but I think every family has some connection to some diagnosis. So I think that’s always, that’s basically always, the case.
But I would also say that while I appreciate being one of the perhaps more prominent advocates on the floor of the House, there are others, there are others on both sides of the aisle. Like, my friend Tom Murt (R-PA 152) Republican out in Philadelphia.
I’ve learned a lot. When we say “diagnosis and disability” these are massive terms. Somebody may know a bit about one doesn’t mean they know a bit about all and as you know, [if] you’ve met one person with a diagnosis you’ve met one person with a diagnosis. So there’s still a lot there.
Scott: (17:14) It is so rare that we have a politician paying attention to disabilities and special needs. Do you think that more politicians will start paying attention as we start accepting mental health issues, physical disabilities? Do you think more politicians will understand that we are a voting block and we are concerned citizens?
PA Rep. Miller: The reality still is that most families with a loved one with a disability, especially, when that loved one is young, they’re hanging on by a thin thread and that usually means two things.
Means one: they appreciate the smallest help that makes a day go better, that makes a concern less and makes them think more positively about the future. The other problem that, or the other issue that I think attaches to that, is a lot of people, a lot of families with disabilities are struggling to find the time to connect with their elected officials. As certain things become easier hopefully and as kids age and hopefully, people with disabilities themselves become great advocates, we need everybody to spend more and more time in talking to their legislatures [and] legislators, both the state and the federal side. And I always, I’ve been trying to say this, that you know if you have an IEP meeting, then every time you have an IEP meeting send an email to every one of your legislators.
So like, most people are like “Well, what’s a reminder? How can I remember?” So if you think about it, look: when we move back the clock, what do you do? You change your batteries, right? On your smoke alarm? When you have an IEP, send an email to your legislators and let them know that special education funding matters that you want to be sure that people with disabilities have or can get a job after they graduate high school and college. You know, let them know that having a full access to SSP Services as a Deaf-Blind Pennsylvanian is an important, essential program that we have to have. That you don’t want to see cuts in Medicaid. You know? Or anything along those lines. It could be a short email. But… And it shouldn’t just be from the nuclear family. What we need to do for people who are concerned about disability and mental health issues is we need to expand beyond that and we need to pull in your cousins, your friends and family. Everybody who cares about a person with a disability or a diagnosis of any type needs to reach out to their legislators to let them know what’s important.
So there is still… We have got to do more. We’re getting better. I’ve been hearing more, but people don’t. Perhaps in some ways. I don’t need to hear more. Perhaps, we need to have that voice magnified across the state.
Scott: (19:56) I want to thank Representative Dan Miller of the 42nd District of the Pennsylvania house for talking to The Autistic Me and mentioning how important it is that we inform our legislators of the important value of autistic individuals other individuals with disabilities.
The fact that we are voters that our parents are voters that our families are voters. We need to be heard and we need to be listened to so I think representative Dan Miller for speaking on this important issue on The Autistic Me.
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