Forward: I have met Phil Valentine a few times over the years. However, this was the first time I had a chance to sit down and have a direct conversation with him. Most of what I know about his work has come from hearing about how instrumental his ideas were to the development of peer … Continue reading Interview #7 – Phil Valentine, Reflections on the Historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Author: billstaufferpa
William Stauffer has been the Executive Director of Pennsylvania Recovery Organization Alliance (PRO-A), the statewide recovery organization of Pennsylvania. He is in long-term recovery since age 21 and has been actively engaged in public policy in the recovery arena for most of those years. He is also an adjunct professor of Social Work at Misericordia University in Dallas Pennsylvania. He holds a Bachelors in Social work degree from Cedar Crest College and a Masters Degree from Kutztown University.
William Stauffer has initiated numerous workforce expansion initiatives for persons in recovery. A major focus of his work has been aimed at moving our entire SUD care system towards a five-year care paradigm to dramatically expand the numbers of Americans in Recovery while saving lives, resources, and communities. Mr. Stauffer has been a staunch advocate for strong SUD Patient Privacy Protections at both the state and federal levels for many years. He ran a recovery house taskforce for the Pennsylvania that helped inform PA Act 59 of 2017. In 2018, he testified in front of the US Senate Special Committee on Aging on the opioid epidemic and older adults, and in 2019, he conducted a hearing with the PA House Human Services Committee to expand recovery opportunities for young people.
He is co-chair of the public policy committee for Faces & Voices of Recovery and the 2019 recipient of the Vernon Johnson Award Individual Recovery Advocate of the year. Mr. Stauffer was also the 2002 Recipient of the Lecie G. Machell prize in Social Work and, prior to taking the position of executive director of PRO-A , received Pennsylvania Recovery Organization Alliances award of the Recovery Advocate of the year, in 2008.
Interview #6 Dona Dmitrovic – Reflections on the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Forward: I first met Dona as she got PRO-A off the ground in those early years of the recovery movement here in Pennsylvania. PRO-A was one of the first statewide Recovery Community Organizations (RCOs) in the nation. I don’t even think I had heard of an RCO before I met Dona. She has had a … Continue reading Interview #6 Dona Dmitrovic – Reflections on the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Interview #5 Tom Hill – Reflections on the Historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Forward: Few people have had as much impact on the way we think about recovery advocacy in America as has Tom Hill. He has been generous of his time with so very many of us in our efforts to strengthen recovery community organizations across the nation. Tom mentored me in his prior role as Senior … Continue reading Interview #5 Tom Hill – Reflections on the Historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Interview #4 Ben Bass – Reflections on the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Forward: As I was calling around to set up interviews, Ben Bass came up in several conversations. Several people in attendance told me he was at the historic St Paul 2001 Recovery Summit. When I did this interview and spoke with him about the summit and his recollections of the beginnings of the new recovery … Continue reading Interview #4 Ben Bass – Reflections on the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Interview #3 Carol McDaid – Reflections on the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Portraits on April 28, 2016. Forward – While I conducted this interview with Carol McDaid over the phone in mid May 2021, recently I also had the opportunity to visit with Carol and her husband John Shinholser founders of the McShin Foundation a few weeks earlier in their home. I visited as spring was breaking … Continue reading Interview #3 Carol McDaid – Reflections on the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement
Take the Drug Addicts Out to the Hospital Parking Lot and Shoot Them
If the title does not repulse you, I think there may be something wrong with you. That is the point of this post. The headline is what a medical professional told former Pennsylvania Secretary of the Department of Drug & Alcohol Programs Gary Tennis when he asked the person what should be done with people … Continue reading Take the Drug Addicts Out to the Hospital Parking Lot and Shoot Them
The Recovery We See
The Dress visual illusion There was this thing going around the internet a few years called “the Dress,” millions of people around the world saw it and chimed in on what color that they perceived the dress to be. It has its own Wikipedia reference. People either see a black and blue dress, or white … Continue reading The Recovery We See
Many Pathways, One Cause
One of the projects I am working on currently is to do interviews with people who attended the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota. I am doing it to develop a deeper understanding of what was occurring at the time and how it all came together. The better we understand such things, the … Continue reading Many Pathways, One Cause
Healing Moral Injury in our SUD Community & Care Service System
In late April, I wrote a piece on moral injury in our SUD care system. Moral injury, as identified in this Scientific American article is the psychic fallout of “morally injurious events, such as perpetrating, failing to prevent, or bearing witness to acts that transgress [one’s own] deeply held moral beliefs and expectations.” It would … Continue reading Healing Moral Injury in our SUD Community & Care Service System
2001 St Paul Recovery Summit Blog Series – Article 2
David Whiters, PhD - Reflections on the historic 2001 Recovery Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the start of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement Forward: In taking on this project to document individual accounts of the historic 2001 recovery summit in St Paul I began to ask around about who attended the summit and how … Continue reading 2001 St Paul Recovery Summit Blog Series – Article 2