All families need assets and some sense of financial security to live for today, plan for the future, and make sure that they and their children can get ahead. For people with disabilities, assets- like owning your own home, starting your own business, or furthering your education- provide connections to your community. Owning assets is the missing piece of the puzzle in the disability community. In order to achieve economic self-sufficiency and full integration into society, people with disabilities need assets.

As a conference partner, the World Institute on Disability is proud to announce the 2006 Assets Learning Conference-A Lifetime of Assets: Building Families, Communities & Economies will take place in Phoenix, Arizona, September 19-21, 2006 and will be the largest gathering of the assets field to date. The assets field is well on its way to helping individuals and families build assets-and this September, CFED (formerly known as the Corporation For Enterprise Development) will gather more than 900 practitioners, researchers, policymakers, financial services providers, and many others to define key priorities to effect even greater change in families, communities, and economies across the country and the world.

The 2006 Assets Learning Conference will offer a comprehensive agenda that covers a range of topics from mobilizing for advocacy, to leveraging the Earned Income Tax Credit as an asset-building tool, and uncovering the latest strategies in reaching underbanked communities. Other sessions will focus on specific populations, such as indigenous communities, children and people with disabilities. Groundbreaking research will be presented by the finalist in the Closing the Wealth Gap: Building Assets among Low-Income Households call for research papers issued by the Community Affairs Offices of the Federal Reserve System and CFED. The agenda is sure to inspire innovation.

The disability community is invited to participate and learn about how asset building programs can help people with disabilities escape the cycle of poverty. As a conference partner, WID's Access to Assets project has been instrumental in helping design the conference and to integrate disability issues into numerous workshops, roundtables, and plenary sessions.

• Exciting changes that will allow more people receiving disability benefits to participate in Individual Development Account (IDA) programs
• Accessible financial literacy curricula
• Innovative Medicaid developments encouraging asset accumulation
• How disability organizations can help consumers earn money by filing income tax returns
• Details on the groundbreaking Asset Accumulation and Tax Policy Project and Tax Facts+ research initiatives designed to study and improve access to asset building opportunities for people with disabilities.

And much more...