About the Integrated Community Project

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The Integrated Community Project (ICP) works to increase the capacity of people with disabilities to become completely engaged in their communities. To do this, the ICP worked initially in three selected counties, Bergen, Camden, and Ocean, assessing communities’ current successes and opportunities to grow their community integration, involvement and engagement. As of 2024, the ICP has expanded to nine counties - Bergen, Camden, Cumberland, Hudson, Middlesex, Ocean, Passaic, Somerset, and Union.

The expanded ICP project will continue to be guided by three expanded regional Leadership Teams that include both the new and regional counties.  The Leadership teams incorporate the expertise of individuals with lived experience with a variety of disabilities and barriers and organizational leaders that support them. Over the rest of this year, the ICP and its Leadership Teams will work to improve, more widely distribute, and use its developed materials - the Self-Assessment for Municipalities and an ICP Toolkit For Municipalities. With leadership from individuals with disabilities and those who work to support them, communities can continue to make decisions to move toward full inclusivity of and understanding of the potential of people of all abilities.

ICP Toolkit For Municipalities

ICP Toolkit Cover Art

The second edition of the Integrated Community Project (ICP) Toolkit For Municipalities is now available.

The first edition of the Integrated Community Project (ICP) Toolkit For Municipalities started as a resource designed to help local communities to increase their community involvement for individuals with physical, intellectual, and developmental disabilities, mental illness, in substance abuse recovery, who are aging, and/or who have experienced homelessness. The Toolkit is a comprehensive set of resources, best practices, and strategies for municipalities and community leaders to better engage people with disabilities and barriers in every aspect of community life. A Spanish translation of the second edition of the Toolkit For Municipalities is available here.

Click here to access a press release for the second edition of the ICP Toolkit For Municipalities.

Westfield Integrated Community Project

The Westfield Integrated Community Project (ICP) was launched in early 2024 to learn how the Town of Westfield successfully involves people with disabilities and barriers in the daily life of the community. The Westfield ICP worked to understand what supportive elements are missing within life in town, and how the town can implement inclusive strategies for the daily lives of residents. The goal of the ICP is to increase the capacity of people with disabilities or barriers to become completely engaged in their communities.

Using the Integrated Community Project (ICP) Toolkit with guidance from people with lived experience, the Westfield ICP developed an action plan to effect changes for the town. This plan includes nine prioritized recommendations around integration that will improve the lives of all individuals, representing a range of populations with various disabilities and barriers.

Through a series of four Westfield ICP Leadership Meetings, community and municipal leaders used Toolkit resources addressing integration and breaking down silos of disabilities and barriers. Leadership teams learned about integration within the following topics: Communication, Transportation, Housing, Civic Engagement, Volunteer and Paid Employment, and Culture and Recreation. Using recommendations from individuals with lived experience serving in the Leadership Team meetings, Westfield ICP stakeholders ranked proposed changes by priority.

The Supportive Housing Association is very grateful for the Westfield Foundation’s support of the Westfield ICP. The Westfield Foundation is proud to fund its grantee, The Supportive Housing Association of New Jersey. Enhancing lives and increasing accessibility is woven throughout its organization’s giving and it looks forward to partnering on future projects.

A copy of the final Westfield ICP report is available here.

A press release on the work of the Westfield ICP is available here.

 

 

 

ICP on Atlantic CIL Podcast

SHA thanks the Atlantic CIL Center and Director Donald Campbell for welcoming Associate Executive Director Kate Kelly and Jesse Schwartzman of the Integrated Community Project (ICP) Leadership Team to discuss the ICP and the Toolkit for Municipalities on Atlantic CIL Center’s podcast. The discussion covered how each resource helps municipalities and organizations support community accessibility for people with disabilities or barriers. Click here to learn about the ICP and the Toolkit and access the podcast episode.

ICP in the Media

Blagica Jankuloska, of the Integrated Community Project (ICP) Leadership Team, addresses the need for accessibility and dialogue on inclusion in the following Op-Ed on NorthJersey.com. Committing to these conversations and actively developing communities of inclusion will help everyone in New Jersey.

ICP Video

The Integrated Community Project (ICP) has created a short video featuring the voices of people with lived experience sharing how they feel when they are not, and just as importantly, when they are, involved in their communities.  Please take a few minutes to learn more about the lived experience that guides the work of the ICP.
Thank you to everyone who participated in the ICP video project.

ICP Funding Provided By:

The ICP was initially funded by an Inclusive Healthy Communities Grant from the Division of Disability Services, New Jersey Department of Human Services.  The New Jersey Council on Developmental Disabilities, The Henry and Mary Taub Foundation, and The Westfield Foundation funded the expansion of the work of the ICP.

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