Disability integration throughout the disaster cycle of prepare, respond and recover

Author's Biography

Mary Casey-Lockyer is the Senior Associate for Disaster Health Services at the American Red Cross, where she also serves on the project steering committee for the Disability Integration for Disaster Cycle service and acts as liaison to the Department of Health and Human Services Secretary’s Operations Center Emergency Management Group. She has presented domestically and internationally on the topic of planning for and responding to those with access and functional needs, including those with disabilities. She has a master’s degree in homeland security for public health preparedness from the Pennsylvania State University Hershey School of Medicine and a bachelor’s of science in nursing from DePaul University.

Shari Myers is Chief Operations Officer of Portlight Strategies, Inc. Her duties have included the coordination of several of Portlight’s Getting It Right conferences, management of response operations in California and South Carolina, including disability stakeholder task forces and long-term recovery casework teams, and disability integration training and education. As part of Portlight’s work with the American Red Cross, Shari is a national and local-level volunteer, and has deployed as disability integration coordinator on four large-scale response operations. Shari Myers is currently the American Red Cross Disaster Cycle Services’ Disability Integration Coordinator. In this role, Shari has deployed to multiple disaster relief operations to assist Red Cross to meet the needs of individuals with access and functional needs including those with disabilities. She formerly held the position of Chief Operations Officer for Portlight Strategies, Inc.