I Support David Segal for RI's First Congressional District

(Patrick Kennedy's  seat)  www.votesegal.com

© 2009, all rights reserved

Welcome to my site...I hope you'll send your feedback ...I want to hear from you!

Greetings! I've been blessed with long-term recovery from the disease of drug addiction since April 13, 2004! This has motivated me to examine my priorities and focus on what's truly important:  family, friends, advocating for the rights of us all to have equal access to medical, counseling and educational services, and of course, music and the arts! This has led to some major changes in my life.  Two of these are going back to school to study politics and law and creating this web site. I am hoping to become more knowledgeable on what our legal rights really are, how to access them, and how to speak out and affect change in the areas of law that are not adequate to meet our needs. This site is a place to share information on these and related subjects with those of you who already are or are yet to come into my life. I've included links to web sites where you can learn more on these subjects.  I've color-coded them by category for convenience as follows:  Addictions Recovery, Teens and Parents, Mental Health, Co-Dependency, Health, Education, Government, Advocacy, Legal, Civil & Human Rights, Employment Services, and Arts and Community. Any links to fee-for-services are providers that offer considerations for lower-income individuals, families, and non-profits. I hope you will join me in putting a face and voice on recovery. Our disease is still discriminated against, as many of you experience on a daily basis. Addicts don't receive equal treatment from health insurance companies regarding coverage and availability of treatment (parity), and legally as long as addiction is treated like a crime instead of the brain disease it really is. It is understood that we need to recover anonymously in our treatment or fellowship programs of choice. However, once we have stabilized, I believe it is our duty to first educate ourselves on how our system of government works and then do our part in changing laws and policies that negatively affect our addictions recovery community and others. Please tell your stories to our representatives and get involved. Everyone needs to know that "once an addict, always an addict" is a lie and that thousands of us are in long-term recovery! I have been privileged to serve as a member of RI Cares, our local addictions recovery advocacy group since 2005. Their website is www.ricares.org & you can call them at 401-521-5759, ext. 14 to get peer support services or get involved in assisting others.  They sent me to Washington D.C. in 2005 (see report below) and make ongoing opportunities available for all of us to learn how to advocate for ourselves and our community. No matter where you are at in your path of recovery, please know that outside the rooms of your fellowships, there is a community of support ready to assist you to do whatever you want to do with your new life. We have friends that want to see us succeed! Let's not complain about the problems if we are not trying to be part of solution! If you like this site, please tell others about it. I look forward to getting your feedback, which you can submit to me directly from the "feedback" link on this site.  Remember:  

"ALONE I CAN'T, TOGETHER WE CAN!"

As of April 2007 I become more disabled with my Multiple Sclerosis. I am, however, able to continue my education at RI College and perform music part-time. As I continue to get my strength back over the next couple of years,  I hope to become involved in public service in one form or another and of course, continue to perform jazz on a regular basis again as I am able...

MEMBERS OF 12-STEP FELLOWSHIPS PLEASE TAKE NOTE: 

OUR CONGRESSMEN & SENATORS WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!

Congressman Patrick Kennedy spoke at the closing ceremony of The Faces & Voices of Recovery's "Recovery Rising!" Summit and praised the recovery going on anonymously in the rooms of the 12-step fellowships, as did our other legislatures with whom we met!  Congressman Kennedy said that the disease of addiction has touched his family personally, and he is aware of our spiritual principals and traditions of anonymity.  He encouraged members of our fellowships to continue in personal recovery in private, and then individually get involved in the community as each feels able.  This will show law makers, the insurance companies, and others that long-term recovery is possible and that many are productive members of society!  This can be done in private conversations with friends and family members, community service and advocacy work (as individuals in recovery, not mentioning our fellowships), or at the very least by contacting our Senators and Congressmen.  They need to know we care about the issues that affect our lives.  He said that if half of the people in recovery contacted their legislators as those have who have breast cancer, our RI Delegation would have no problem getting these important bills passed on our behalf!  Let's flood their mailboxes, voicemails, and e-mail boxes with our wants and concerns.  If they feel they won't get your vote if they don't support us, we can make such a difference!  

AND IF YOU'VE BEEN DENIED YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE BECAUSE OF PAST FELONY CONVICTIONS, TELL THEM YOU WANT YOUR VOTE BACK!

CLICK ON THEIR NAME BELOW TO GO TO THEIR WEB SITE

OR THEIR PICTURE TO SEE THEIR VOTING RECORD & OTHER INFORMATION:

Congressman Jim Langevin

Senator Jack Reed

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse

Congressman Patrick Kennedy

NEED HELP KNOWING WHAT TO SAY?    GO TO: A CALL TO ACTION

RHODE ISLAND COMMUNITIES FOR ADDICTIONS RECOVERY

11th Annual Legislative Day on May 19th, 2010 at the RI Statehouse Rotunda, 2-4 PM:

Over 100 people attended / Leslie Miller, Master of Ceremony

Ian Knowles, RICARES' Director, Words of Welcome / Bobby Oliveira, "A Call to Action"

We awarded Dale K. Klatzker, PhD, President of The Providence Center with our RICARES' Advocate of the Year Award.

We awarded RI Representative Scott A. Slater with our RICARES' RI Representative of the Year Award for his work on House Bill No. 8060, also known as "Ban the Box."

We awarded Senator Charles J. Levesque with our RICARES' RI Senator of the Year Award for his work on legislation that will divert more RI Islanders who get arrested for drug charges into treatment instead of prison using the already successful Drug Court Program.

Bruce Reilly from Direct Action for Rights and Equality (DARE) did a great job speaking about their work with Representative Slater on "Ban the Box."

Sol Rodriguez, Executive Director of Open Doors, RI, also did a great job explaining about their work with Senator Levesque on the "Into Treatment, not Prison" legislation.

After our ceremony, our Board and some members attended the day's session of the House and Senate where Representative Slater and Senator Levesque were presented with over 100 letters of support from our members regarding the legislation they were sponsoring on behalf of the recovery community.

I Support David Segal for RI's First Congressional District

(Patrick Kennedy's  seat)  www.votesegal.com

For the last 8 years, David Segal has delivered for Rhode Island’s working families — first as a Providence City Councilman, and now as a State Representative for East Providence and Providence. He has worked to crack down on banks and predatory lenders; helped families facing foreclosures; restored critical funding to Rhode Island’s schools and municipal services; paved the way for green jobs and renewable energy; and stood up for civil rights and civil liberties. Let’s help send David Segal to Congress, where he can continue to fight for progressive causes and working families in Rhode Island!
 

For putting a face and voice on the RI Addictions-Recovery Community for over 11 years!

www.ricares.org

HOMEPAGE FEATURES:

A CALL TO ACTION

FACES AND VOICES OF RECOVERY LAST NATIONAL RECOVERY SUMMIT REPORT (SEPTEMBER 2005)

FAVORITE LINKS

GREG ABATE (INTERNATIONAL JAZZ REED PLAYER EXTRAORDINAIRE & MY FORMER JAZZ THEORY PROFESSOR)

KUDOS TO YOU!

MS CORNER

MY TWO CENTS WORTH

MARK YOUR CALENDAR

ONGOING EVENTS

SHAWNN MONTEIRO (INTERNATIONAL JAZZ PERFORMER EXTRAORDINAIRE & MY FORMER JAZZ VOCALS  PROFESSOR!)

TWO IMPORTANT RECOVERY ARTICLES:  BRAIN CHEMISTRY TRUMPS WILLPOWER; THE SCIENCE OF ADDICTION 

Katie with her Mom at 1 Month Old

Grandpa Bill & Katie

Katie & Jess:

Memorial Day Weekend 2010:

                    My friend Angela came to meet my kids & grandkids!

Summer 2009 Tuesday Jazz Vocalist Showcase:

I had a wonderful summer at the Side Bar in Providence. Jean McKenna-O'Donnell and I co-hosted a singers' showcase accompanied by Odie Teken on keyboard and Todd Baker on bass. Please go to my new jazz web site to see pictures and hear sound clips from that series:  www.lesliemilllerjazz.com/

I'm winding down in my studies at RI College, and although I don't take lessons with her anymore, I will forever be indebted to my former Professor Shawnn Monteiro (website), who is internationally known and amazing! I am very impressed with the level of professionalism that the RI College music faculty manifests. With talents like Shawnn, Greg Abate (website) and others, music students at RI College have wonderful opportunities to learn from the "real deals" in music! I've been saying that Shawnn's the real deal all along and it seems the world agrees! Here's a quote from "The Garlic Blog" on Google:

"If you never had the opportunity to catch Ella, Sarah, Carmen McRae, Betty Carter, et all, than you should make all effort to indulge in their torch-carrier, vocalist Shawnn Monteiro."

 

pictures of Shawnn

(picture on left is Shawnn with her godfather Clark Terry)

Visit Shawnn's website.

You can purchase Shawnn's CDs on Amazon or CD Universe

My Former Professor Greg Abate performing with Mac Chrupcala on piano and Alan Bernstein on bass at Chan's in Woonsocket, RI: Greg's website

  Me performing in "An Adult Song and Dance Revue" at RI College on May 18, 2007, accompanied by the Ron Bianchi Trio:

To see a video clip of my singing from the DVD of the May 18th show mentioned above or to listen to audio clips click HERE.

My son Taylor joined a local band called "Mourning the Dead." They are all awesome musicians (the drummer used to play jazz drums!) and Taylor is playing guitar and writing songs with them as well! Here's their "My Space" page: http://www.myspace.com/wearemourningthedead

Here's pictures of him at a recent gig at the Living Room in Providence, RI:

This page was last updated 07/06/10

Site design & management:  Leslie Miller