Editorial: Promoting Full Access to Society

In 1998, the Syracuse Developmental Center closed its doors amid a national movement to shift people with disabilities from institutional settings into the community. Thirteen years later, that transition is still under way: The West Seneca Developmental Center near Buffalo in July became the seventh residential development center the state has closed, and four more are targeted for closure by 2014.
The end to “warehousing” people with disabilities reflects a welcome growth in the inclusion of people of different abilities. Derogatory labels are now unacceptable, and people are quick to criticize the unenlightened few who occasionally utter the “R-word.”