Integrated Living Opportunities (ILO)

ILO is a 501c3 nonprofit established in 2015 by a group of families under the leadership of Maedi Tanham Carney. ILO is committed to helping individuals with developmental disabilities live full active lives in the wider community. The key to achieving this goal is supporting the self-advocates with intentional communities.

What is an intentional community?

It involves creating community “pods” (groups of self-advocates living in close proximity) and developing teams of paid and unpaid individuals to support each self-advocate. Intentional communities ensure self-advocates maintain their skills, develop new ones and are fully integrated into their communities.

Currently, ILO has the support of 20 participating families, and is hard at work developing community pods one in Germantown, Gaithersburg, and Bethesda MD, as well as in Washington, D.C. If you would like to learn more about these community pods, intentional communities, or the work that ILO is doing to create independent, inclusive, community based living options in the Maryland and D.C. areas, please contact ILO’s founder, President of the Board and CEO, Maedi Tanham Carney, for more information. Or, visit our website at ilonow.org to learn more.

If you are interested in joining ILO and helping us expand our networks of support, please let us know!

For further reading on ILO, including our core values, vision, and our mission statement, please browse through our Integrated Living Opportunities blog archive from the Blog Category drop-down menu on the right hand side of the website.