Robert Stack

Robert Stack has been a national leader in the continuing struggle to improve the lives of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. One of the first in the nation to implement a national nonprofit implementing an alternative to the warehousing of the disabled in large institutions.

Stack was one of the first to pioneer the concept of community-based housing programs and work force training and development. He actively challenged public policy and antiquated clinical practices that inhibited opportunities for self-efficacy and individual growth.

As a young civil servant in 1980 at the then entitled New York State Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities, he opened the first two state-operated group homes on the grounds of Long Island's Suffolk Developmental Center. As Deputy Director at the New Jersey Division of Developmental Disabilities in 1988, he led the efforts to migrate individuals out of high-density institutions.

His vision realized changes years before the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and a decade before the Olmstead decision by the Supreme Court directed states toward this policy change. Stack’s dedication toward the disabled community led to the first closure of a large developmental institution in New Jersey.