Environmental Health Initiative
Advisory Board Members

With the support of the John Merck Fund, the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (AAIDD), formerly AAMR, launched an environmental health initiative that brings together the developmental disabilities network with the environmental health community to collaborate on issues of mutual concern. The overall goal is to build a diverse and educated constituency of parents, service providers, professionals, and advocates who will work in support of expanded research, progressive policy, and exemplary services, while educating others about the complex connections between toxic substances and developmental disabilities.

The initiative began in July 2003 when AAIDD convened a National Summit where leaders from academia, the environmental health field, the developmental disabilities community, and others - framed a National Action Blueprint designed to achieve the goal of effective collaboration. The Blueprint includes recommendations ranging from local to international levels in the areas of education, outreach, training, legislation, policy, and research.

AAIDD's Environmental Health Initiative thanks our board members whose leadership and expertise on intellectual and developmental disabilities and in environmental health, have contributed greatly to our successes.

Laura Abulafia, MHS, Director of AAIDD's Environmental Health Initiative
Ms. Abulafia has been the Director of the EHI since Fall of 2006. As Director, she collaborates with a network of organizations and health professionals to get the Developmental Disabilities community in the US aware of environmental exposures to toxins.  She received her Masters in Health Sciences from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Department of Environmental Health Sciences. Prior to recieving her masters degree, Ms. Abulafia's interests centered around children's environmental health and public health. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from Washington University in St. Louis, and worked for the Interdisciplinary Law Clinic at Washington University in St Louis on topics of environmental health. For more information on Laura Abulafia, please click here.

Deborah Cohen, PhD - Dr. Cohen was appointed the first permanent director of the New Jersey Office for Prevention of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities (OPMRDD) in the Department of Human Services in July, 1988. Since joining the Office for Prevention, Dr. Cohen has been responsible for implementing public education programs regarding the prevention of developmental disabilities. The Office for Prevention was the driving force to re-organize the New Jersey Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Task Force in 1998 and to publish the report, The Truth and Consequences of FAS: Why New Jersey Should Be Concerned, in 2001. This report has resulted in much FAS activity in the State, including a State appropriation of $450,000 to support FAS Diagnostic Centers. Nationally, Dr. Cohen is a member of both the National Task Force on FAS/FAE and the Steering Committee of the National Center for Excellence in FASD. She has been a member of the Health Promotion and Disability Prevention Committee of The Arc of the United States since 1989 and is its current chair. She also served as the Chair of the Health Promotion and Disability Prevention Committee of the American Association on Mental Retardation.

Dr. Cohen earned her BA at the University of Pittsburgh; an M.Ed. from Boston University; an MPA from Northeastern University; and her Ph.D. from Brandeis University, the Florence Heller School for Advanced Studies in Social Policies. Obviously, Dr. Cohen likes school more than she likes work, although a steady income also has its merits.

Sharon Davis, PhD - Dr. Davis is the former director of professional and family services for The Arc of the United States in Silver Spring, MD. Before retirement, she directed the operation of The Arc's grant funded projects and manages several of The Arc's programs including the convention workshop program. Prior to joining The Arc in 1984, Dr. Davis worked for several agencies in the Washington, D.C. area including the American Coalition of Citizens with Disabilities, The Council for Exceptional Children and Rehab Group, Inc. where she directed federally funded projects focusing on concerns of people with disabilities. Dr. Davis received her Ph.D. in Education from Cornell University. She is the parent of an adult daughter with an intellectual disability.

Gordon Johnson, Esq - Gordon J. Johnson has been an Assistant Attorney General in the Environmental Protection Bureau of the New York Attorney General's office since 1983. He currently is the Bureau's Deputy Bureau Chief for the New York City office, where he supervises a staff of more than 35 lawyers, scientists, and support staff. He has handled numerous types of matters involving environmental issues on behalf of the State and the Attorney General's office including affirmative cases requiring cleanups of toxic waste sites, recovering damages for injuries to natural resources of the State, and challenging USEPA regulations; enforcement cases against violators of state and federal environmental laws; and cases defending the State's air permitting programs, state agency permits and orders regarding various environmental requirements, and other state agencies' decisions. He has given testimony before the United States House of Representatives and Senate on behalf of New York and the National Association of Attorneys General concerning proposed Clean Water Act amendments, Superfund reauthorization, and the Hudson River cleanup. Mr. Johnson is a member of the International Environmental Law Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, and has been a member of its Environmental Law Committee. He received his B.A. from Oberlin College, and his J.D. cum laude from New York University School of Law.

Elise Miller, MEd - Ms. Miller is founder and executive director of the National Institute for Children's Environmental Health based in Freeland, Washington. The Institute's primary mission is to foster collaborative initiatives to reduce environmental exposures that can undermine the health of current and future generations. Prior to directing the Institute, she was the founding executive director of the Jenifer Altman Foundation, a private foundation in northern California with interests in sustainable development, mind-body health, environmental health, and issues affecting disadvantaged children. She recently completed a three year Fetzer Institute Fellowship and currently serves on the board of directors of the Children's Environmental Health network and the Whidbey Institute as well as several national advisory boards. Ms. Miller received her Masters degree in Education from Harvard University in 1992 and her Bachelor's degree with high honors from Dartmouth College in 1985.

Joseph P. Meadours - Self Advocate, and Executive Director of Peoples First of California, Inc. Joe Meadours has been an advocate in the disability movement since 1992. In 1998, he was selected by the President's Committee on Mental Retardation to be the recipient of the Elizabeth Monroe Boggs award for Young Leadership. Mr. Meadours has worked in several States, including Oklahoma, where he is Past- President of Oklahoma People First. He has also worked in Tennessee and Illinois and in Alabama as Director of Consumer Empowerment, State of Alabama, Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation. He has served on numerous boards in many States. He is a firm believer that "We should fund people and not programs. Everybody can live a Self Determined life with support, if they need it." Mr. Meadours was born in Selma, Alabama. He enjoys all sports especially going to baseball games and riding his bicycle. His goal in life is to go to law school and to become a State Representative in Oklahoma.

Wendy Nehring, PhD - Dr. Nehring is the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Director of the Graduate Programs, and Associate Professor at the College of Nursing, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. She joined the faculty at Rutgers in July 2003. Dr. Nehring is nationally known in the field of intellectual and developmental disabilities and human patient simulation. She wrote the only nursing history book on nursing in the field of intellectual and developmental disabilities and she and her colleagues are revising the Scope and Standards of Practice in the specialty. Dr. Nehring is the editor of an upcoming book on a core curriculum for nurses and health professionals specializing in the field of developmental disabilities. She has written and presented widely on this nursing specialty.

Ted Schettler, MD, MPH - Dr. Schettler serves on the medical staff of Boston Medical Center and has a clinical practice at the East Boston Neighborhood Health Center. He is also science director for the Science and Environmental Health Network and co-chair of the Human Health and Environment Project of Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility. Dr. Schettler co-authored "Generations at Risk," which examines the reproductive health effects of exposure to a variety of environmental toxicants, and "In Harm's Way - Toxic Threats to Child Development," which examines the impacts of environmental contaminants on children's neurological development. He has served on advisory committees of the US Environmental Protection Agency and National Academy of Science.

Sheryl White Scott, MD -