Happy anniversary, OSSA! A note from our Executive Director, Katie Rose

Today, the Oregon Support Services Association celebrates its nine year anniversary of incorporation. The collection of 14 Support Service Brokerages created the association in 2010, 10 years after Brokerages were formed and began serving people with developmental disabilities and their families. Since our beginning, we have had the pleasure to get to know many thousands of people across the state, including the nearly 8,000 people currently in services. The increasing complexity of our agencies, as we've grown, and of Oregon's service system over the past nine years, has called for our increasing participation in advocacy, policy work, and in encouraging and supporting people in services to engage as well.

OSSA’s Executive Director, Katie Rose.

Nearly five years ago, I was hired as Executive Director to develop relationships, find solutions, and increase our ability to effect positive change for people using Brokerage services. I am the voice behind this blog site, and I do my best to share the knowledge and information that I gather in the course of my work. I would like to thank the members of the association--the 14 Brokerage Directors across Oregon finding their way through shifting terrain. Their determination, passion, and tireless attention to self-improvement is what makes my job wonderful. They do excellent, change-making work, and I get to represent that work with decision-makers everywhere, and talk about it with pride and gratitude.

I would also like to take the chance to appreciate Oregon's incredible DD advocacy community, and the important conversations and problem-solving efforts I've been drawn into over the years. The Brokerages have responded to the need for advocacy time and again over the past decade, and we are so grateful to be able to do so.

The coming year will bring change--new projects, new policies, and new faces. We cannot freeze things in time, as much as we might wish we could. What we can do is to keep our values, and the voices of people using these services and their families, at the center of decisions that we make. We can commit our time and energy to exploring better ways to do this work. We can, and we will.

Season's greetings to you and to the people you care about. As we move into the new year, may you find inspiration, joy, and peace.

Katie Rose, Oregon Support Services Association