National Civil Rights Housing Expert Returns to Bazelon

Washington, DC, December 17, 2009 – The Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law is pleased to announce the return of a national expert in housing and civil rights law, Bonnie Milstein. Milstein will act as Bazelon’s Director of Housing Policy, spearheading a reinvigorated housing advocacy initiative at the Center.

“We are thrilled to have Bonnie back at the Bazelon Center. Her work in promoting community integration has changed the way our society thinks about people with disabilities,” said Robert Bernstein, Ph.D., executive director of the Bazelon Center.

“She will lead our charge to ensure that Olmstead-based integration principles are recognized as a priority at the federal level and are increasingly incorporated into all aspects of life for people with mental illnesses,” Bernstein added.

During her first tour at the Bazelon Center, Milstein headed the successful Community Watch program aimed at overcoming barriers to community-based living arrangements, such as discrimination by landlords and inconsistent federal regulations, for children and adults with mental disabilities. She pressed successfully for the inclusion of people with mental disabilities in the drafting and passage of the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988, the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Civil Rights Restoration Act.

Throughout, she led the Housing Task Force of the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities (CCD) in amicus briefs to the Supreme Court and pursued administrative advocacy with the Departments of Justice, Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Labor and Education.

In 1994, Milstein moved to HUD, where she directed the agency’s enforcement of civil rights laws, and then to San Francisco, where she became the department’s Fair Housing Co-Director and Community Builder. In recent years she has worked as a housing and disability specialist in her consulting firm, Equal Opportunity Strategies.

As Director of Housing Policy at Bazelon, Milstein will address civil rights issues in housing for people with mental illnesses. She will work with low-income, civil rights and disability groups to continue moving people with mental illnesses from institutions into mainstream housing.

“I’m excited about using the energy from the Obama administration to eradicate barriers that keep people from fulfilling their dreams,” said Milstein. “We have much to accomplish to ensure that people with mental disabilities are able to achieve fully integrated lives in the community.”