New strides are being made to help New Yorkers with disabilities live more independently and make more of their own choices.

For Keith Knox, that starts with something as simple as checking the mail. The routine walk to his mailbox is easy. Reading what is inside is not.

“I’m visually impaired,” Knox said in an interview. Once a month, he brings his mail to the Capital District Center for Independence, where staff read it with him, help him fill out food stamp and Medicaid forms, and navigate paperwork that has become harder to see as his vision declines.

Knox has hydrocephalus, a condition that can cause blurry, impaired vision. As his sight worsened over the years, he turned to the center for help staying in his own home.

“They call me frequently to check on me,” he said. “I told them I needed housing, and then they referred me.”

Beyond regular check-ins with Knox, the Capital District Center for Independence serves people of all ages with all types of disabilities from across the region and partners with organizations around New York state.

“People with disabilities are people first,” said Laurel Kelley, executive director of the center. “So everyone wants to live in the community. I mean, I think it’s a human need.”

Kelley said the organization follows the independent living philosophy, the idea that people with disabilities should have the same rights and choices as anyone else about where and how they live.

That push for independence is increasingly reflected in state policy. On Tuesday, the state Office for People With Developmental Disabilities and AIM Services, a nonprofit that supports people with developmental and other disabilities across New York, announced a new supported decision-making program.

Supported decision-making allows a person with a disability to choose trusted supporters to help them understand options and communicate decisions, instead of handing that authority to a court-appointed guardian. Advocates say it is a less restrictive alternative to guardianship and keeps control in the hands of the person.

“I do my own cooking, do my own meds,” said Dwight Joyner, who receives services through AIM. “When my meds get low, I can call people. I can call the pharmacy [and] tell them I’m low on meds, low on pills [and] low on insulin.”

Christopher Lyons, chief executive officer of AIM Services, said the model is designed to replace “draconian” forms of control.

“This replaces the draconian control of guardianship with the opportunity for people to learn from their choices, with support from those who they identify to impart meaning in their lives, on their terms,” Lyons said. “That’s what supported decision-making is designed to do.”

OPWDD Commissioner Willow Baer said the state’s goal is to expand tools that let people direct their own lives.

“We are putting the right tools in the hands of people with disabilities to make sure they can direct their own decisions about their own lives,” Baer said.

As more programs like this roll out, advocates say the goal is simple: treat everyone equally, and keep supporting independence for people with disabilities, no matter the label.

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New program expands in­de­pen­dence for New Yorkers with dis­abil­ities