Legal and Advocacy Resources
The organizations can provide information on the legal rights and responsibilities of people with psychiatric disabilities. Some can also advocate on behalf of people with disabilities and teach people to advocate for themselves.
300 Russell Road
Wethersfield, CT 06109
1-800-573-6929 (in Connecticut)
860 667-0460 phone
860 667-2240 fax
Advocacy Unlimited, Inc. is a nationally recognized grassroots, nonprofit consumer–run organization that helps persons with psychiatric disabilities and their families. They believe everyone should be treated equally, regardless of race, gender, or disability.
Knowledge and skills ensure that people play a central role in shaping services and policies that affect their lives. Their primary purpose is to educate persons with psychiatric disabilities in self-advocacy, systems advocacy, and legislative advocacy skills.
AU's advocacy education training might be of particular interest to mental health consumers looking to help themselves and help other people in recovery by learning their rights, realizing their goals and passing information and the belief of hope and recovery on.
They also provide information and referrals, a monthly newsletter, legislative alerts and more.
1101 15th Street,
NW, Suite 1212
Washington, DC 20005-5002
Phone: 202-467-5730
Fax: 202-223-0409
TDD: 202-467-4232
The Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law is a nonprofit legal advocacy organization based in Washington D.C. that advocates for the rights of individuals with mental disabilities. The Center's advocacy is based on the principle that every individual is entitled to choice and dignity. For many people with mental disabilities, this means something as basic as having a decent place to live, supportive services, and equality of opportunity. The Bazelon Center has been instrumental in several landmark policy and legislative initiatives to protect the rights of people with disabilities.
Bazelon Center attorneys provide technical support for and co-counsel selected lawsuits with private lawyers, legal services programs, ACLU chapters and state protection and advocacy systems (P&As). The Center collaborates with local, regional and national advocacy and consumer organizations to reform public systems and promote consumer participation in the design and operation of service programs. However, the Bazelon Center does NOT handle individual requests for information or assistance. The Center's website provides an extensive listing of on-line recovery resources, allows you to register to be alerted of critical mental health legislative initiatives, and provides guidance regarding the best way to become involved in advocacy efforts.
The Bazelon Center also publishes many handbooks, manuals, papers, and reports explaining key legal and policy issues in everyday terms, and many of these resource are available free of charge through the Center's website noted above. Topics covered include such things as: fair housing issues, the preparation of psychiatric advance directives, and legal protections for people with Psychiatric Disabilities. For example, the Center's publication Mental Health Issues in the Workplace: How the Americans with Disabilities Act Protects You Against Employment Discrimination may be of particular interest to readers.
P.O. Box 351, Silver Street
Middletown, CT 06457
860 262-5030
860 262-5035 fax
Connecticut Legal Rights Project, Inc. (CLRP), is an independent, nonprofit agency which advocates for low income adults who have, or are perceived to have, a psychiatric disability. CLRP is separate from the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (DMHAS).
62 Washington Street
Middletown, CT 06457
800 453-3320
860 344-0447
860 346-2938 fax
Connecticut Legal Services is a not-for-profit law firm dedicated to representing, advising and educating low-income individuals and families in matters relating principally to civil law and thereby helping them secure the protections, privileges, benefits, rights and opportunities this law provides.
60B Weston Street
Hartford, CT 06120
800 842-7303
860 297-4300
860 566-2102 TDD
860 566-8714 fax
The Office of Protection and Advocacy for Persons with disabilities (better known as "P and A") is an independent state agency created to safeguard and advance the civil and human rights of people with disabilities in Connecticut. They provide information, referral, and advocacy services; pursue legal and administrative remedies on behalf of people with disabilities who experience disability-related discrimination; conduct investigations into complaints from people with disabilities, and into allegations of abuse and neglect with respect to adults who have mental retardation (ages 18-59), and people in psychiatric facilities; and provide public education and training on disability issues and to inform policy makers about issues affecting people with disabilities.
