Need legal help?
To request help in protecting your rights:
Online: Use our online intake form. Be sure to completely fill out the form. You may save and continue your work later. If you have trouble with the form or questions about how to fill it out, what information to include, or if you need an accommodation, please call our office at the number listed below.
After you submit the form, one of our intake staff will contact you within two business days.
Email: intake@disabilityrightsnc.org
Phone: Our office is open between 8AM and 5PM, Monday through Friday.
Local: 919-856-2195
Toll Free (within NC): 1-877-235-4210
TTY: 1-888-268-5535
Help Us Welcome Equal Justice Works Fellow Joonu-Noel Andrews Coste
Coste, who joined the DRNC team on September 3, will focus her Equal Justice Works Fellowship on reducing North Carolina’s over-reliance on Psychiatric Residential Treatment Facilities (PRTFs) and ending the “PRTF-to-prison pipeline” in North Carolina.
Disaster Recovery Project
DRNC is thrilled to have begun work on a new disaster preparedness and recovery project. Following Hurricane Florence, DRNC remains committed to ensuring North Carolinians with disabilities are able to access the information and services they need to be prepared for disasters, and recover when the unthinkable happens. To learn more about this issue, please read our report:
Access the Vote NC
DRNC has relaunched our Voting Rights initiative - Access the Vote NC! As part of this initiative we have produced a first-of-its-kind accessible voter guide for the CD9 special election. Head to the website to read more about the initiative, your rights to vote, and view the accessible guide options.
Inclusive Employment
DRNC continues to work towards fully inclusive employment for all. Following a a two-year investigation into employment services in the state, including interviews with hundreds of workers with disabilities who are paid less than the federal and state minimum wage, we have released a report, Moving Into the Economic Mainstream, and renewed calls for inclusive employment practices.
About us
Disability Rights North Carolina (DRNC) is the federally designated protection and advocacy agency for the State of North Carolina. We are also a nonprofit organization. DRNC provides resources for self-advocacy and community engagement. In addition we engage in strategic civil litigation, advocate for policy changes, and work to educate the public about disability rights and the disability community.
Community Living
Advocating for the employment of people with disabilities in competitive and integrated jobs & enforcing the right of people with disabilities to have equal access to their communities.
Disaster Prep & Recovery
Providing focused advocacy for disaster preparedness and recovery by identifying local resources, participating in local stakeholder groups, community organizing and advocating on behalf of individuals with disabilities.
Education
Ensuring that students with disabilities attend school free from abuse, including abusive interventions.
Investigations & Monitoring
Keeping people safe in facilities through monitoring efforts and by investigating deaths and allegations of abuse and neglect.
Prisons & Jails
Monitor jail deaths, advocate for improved treatment, and advocate for improved jail rules, including mandatory suicide prevention programs.
Services - Medicaid, etc.
Reduce unnecessary institutionalization of individuals with disabilities and advance home and community-based healthcare services and support.
Social Services - Representative Payees
Monitoring and investigating how representative payees administer Social Security funds for beneficiaries.
Voting
Working to ensure elections in North Carolina are accessible, and that the disability community knows their voting rights.
We belong to the National Disability Rights Network
DRNC is a member of the National Disability Rights Network (NDRN). NDRN is the nonprofit membership organization for the federally mandated Protection and Advocacy (P&A) Systems in every state and U.S. territory. The P&A/CAP network is the largest provider of legally based advocacy services to people with disabilities in the United States. For more more information, or to search for the P&A in other states, please visit: https://www.ndrn.org/about/ndrn-member-agencies/
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