Someone You Should Know

Kevin Irvine, Senior Advocate

In the flurry of Kevin Irvine's sometimes daily emails - updates on transportation rights issues for people with disabilities, AIDS-related actions, and any number of topics that typically promote grass-roots responses - you get the feeling that this is a man making up for lost time, a man compelled to get the word out and get people, if not angry, at least stirred up enough to become agents of change. He has been featured in or written articles for a variety of magazines and journals, including USA Today, Details, POZ, and the now-defunct disability-focused website, Wemedia.com, and has addressed such bodies as the National Institutes of Health AIDS Program Advisory Committee. He voices public opinions on issues most of us would probably rather shy away from and that rarely surface in "mainstream" media: safer sex education of adolescents, the disability-rights perspective in the movement to oppose legalization of physician-assisted death, the importance of disability pride and recognition of disability culture. And no forum is too small or remote. Responding to an ad that offered "HIV negative status" cards in the Weekly Alibi (a small Albuquerque weekly), Kevin's letter to the editor states, "This xenophobic ad plays to the lowest common denominators in our society."

Kevin Irvine, Senior Advocate at Equip for Equality As a senior advocate who joined Equip for Equality in 1998, Kevin divides his time between training on disability rights and transportation rights advocacy. He played a key role on the Equip for Equality legal team in the Access Living et al. v. Chicago Transit Authority lawsuit. The five-year class action settlement agreement includes significant requirements that have made the CTA's trains, buses and other services more accessible to people with disabilities. Since the settlement, Kevin has been one of the most active advocates and spokespersons for transit accessibility both locally and nationally.

"Kevin's life experience as a person with disabilities and his passion for disability civil rights make him an invaluable member of our Legal Advocacy team," said Barry Taylor, Equip for Equality's Legal Advocacy Director. "His expertise on the transportation rights of people with disabilities is a tremendous benefit to the community."

As a person who was born with hemophilia, a bleeding disorder, got his first knee replacement at 22, and who has lived with HIV for over 20 years, Kevin is no stranger to the disability community and the personal and collective issues its members face.

"Growing up, my initial identity was that of a person with disabilities, although I didn't put too much thought into it. I even lent my name to some blood drives. Then, when I reached adolescence, I didn't want to stand out for something that wasn't 'cool' so I did my best to 'pass' as being able-bodied. I also had no interest in testing the community's tolerance for an HIV+ high-school student. With a visible limp from the complications of hemophilia, I'm not sure that I 'passed.' It was a confining and painful way to live. In 1990, I 'came out' as a person with hemophilia and HIV and have lived openly and proudly with my disabilities ever since."

After graduating from Purchase College (State University of New York) in 1991, with a degree in writing, Kevin returned to his hometown in Northern California and worked as a community skills trainer with adults with developmental disabilities. In 1993, he moved to Albuquerque and worked as a disability-rights advocate and peer counselor at the Independent Living Resource Center. When Kevin saw problems in the system - as has been his modus vivendi since embracing his disabilities, including a stint with ACT-UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) in the early 1990s - he took action.

"Working in Albuquerque, I saw how Medicaid laws forced segregation of people with disabilities by requiring funding for nursing facility placement and not for home & community based services. With other New Mexico disability rights activists, I organized a new chapter of ADAPT (Americans Disabled for Attendant Programs Today). We used direct action to pressure our government to end the 'institutional bias' of long-term care funding and were involved in the effort that resulted in the introduction of the first MiCASSA bill by Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and Congressman Dick Gephardt." *

His involvement in ADAPT also introduced him to Karen Tamley, then an ADAPT activist from Denver and now the Director of Programs at Access Living of Metropolitan Chicago. "I attended a training presented by a talented, smart and beautiful ADAPT activist, who is now my wife! As a person who uses a wheelchair and who also grew up with her disability in Northern California, Karen and I were drawn to each other: both politically and emotionally."

*Congress has not yet passed the highly supported MiCASSA (Medicaid Community Attendant Services and Supports Act).

Subscribe to the Equalizer | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use