Erica McFadden, Director of the Office of Independent Living Programs (OILP) at the Administration on Community Living, Administration on Disabilities.
For nearly 25 years, Erica’s career has focused on disability rights and independent living. In one of her first leadership roles, she served as Executive Director of the Living Independently Now Center, Inc. (LINC) and Vice President of the Illinois Network of Centers for Independent Living. While at LINC, she developed, managed, implemented, and evaluated programs and led LINC’s advocacy efforts in metro-East St. Louis – a racially and geographically diverse service area. Under her leadership, LINC increased the support delivered to assist people with disabilities in living independently by more than 300%, increased revenues by 50%, and established two satellite offices, as well as an aging and disability resource center that won the National Council on Independent Living award for Best Practices in Aging & Disability collaboration. LINC was cited as one of the five most innovative programs in the country by the Association of Programs for Rural Independent Living for its "CIL without walls" concept.
She also grew LINC's advocacy efforts by strategically collaborating with state and federal officials, disability organizations, grant makers and other partners to raise the profile and visibility of LINC, Inc. and its services and programs. She developed and implemented a formal volunteer program, expanding the organization’s capacity and implemented and supervised an effective budgeting and accounting system, and performance measurement software for all grant and contract reporting, that improved efficiency and reduced costs.
Since 2016, Erica has served as the Executive Director of the Arizona Developmental Disabilities Planning Council. In this role, she frequently collaborated with the IL community, serving on the Board of Ability 360. Erica has sat on numerous legislative, state agency, and governor-led committees at the invitation of state leaders.
