The NCTC Team

Leslie Wilson, M.S.

President/CEO NCTC, A Division of Wilson Resources, Inc.

As president/CEO over the past 20 years, Leslie Wilson has consulted with major corporations, federal courts, federal and state agencies and private nonprofits in states from coast-to-coast.

Leslie Wilson serves on the National APSE: The Network on Employment Board of Directors, is a member of the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce’s Leadership Tampa Class of 2010, and the recipient of the 2003 National Leadership Award and the 2004 Businesswoman of the Year, both presented by the National Congressional Committee’s Business Advisory Council.  Her company was also awarded the 2009 United States Business Leadership Network 2009 Exceptional Leadership Award “Partner of the Year.” In 2009 she became a certified Mental Health First Aid instructor, a program of the National Council for Community Behavioral Healthcare, and completed The Disney Institute’s 5-day course, Disney’s Approach to Business Excellence. In January 2009, WRI was selected as one of 600 woman-owned businesses nationwide to participate in the Count Me In for Women’s Economic Independence, Sam’s Club 600. Ms. Wilson is listed in the International Presidential Who’s Who Among Business and Professional Achievers, 2009 Edition and the National Register – Who’s Who in Executives and Professionals, 2004 Edition, International Executive Guild, Bethpage, NY.

For the past six years, WRI has been engaging employers through development and staffing of successful local Florida Business Leadership Networks (BLNs), employer-to-employer organizations dedicated to promoting the employment of people with disabilities. More than 600 BLN business members have joined the local Florida BLNs. Notable companies like Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida (BCBSF), the BLNs’ statewide champion, Merrill Lynch, the Federal Reserve Bank, Hyatt Hotels, SunTrust Bank, Jacksonville Aviation Authority, Aderant, Walgreens and Holland and Knight Law Firm are BLN members. The BLNs and the employers who belong to them have won every major United States Business Leadership Network award. In 2003, the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission during a review of Florida’s efforts to expand the employment of people with disabilities named Florida’s local BLNs a model public/private partnership.

In 2010, the BLNs and WRI are launching the Disability Friendly Business Certification Program using an extensive assessment tool to determine corporate accessibility, as well as other issues, related to employees and customers with disabilities.

WRI has organized and provided onsite training on the employment of people with disabilities at such companies as Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida (BCBSF), American Express, AvMed, AmeriGroup, CSX and other large corporations. BCBSF staff have declared that involvement in the BLNs and the BLN sponsored paid internship program have changed the company’s corporate culture. Individuals with disabilities are currently working in entry level to skilled BCBSF positions.

Through WRI’s contracts with CESSI, a contractor of the Social Security Administration (SSA), WRI is promoting the SSA’s “New” Ticket to Work Program (TTW). WRI is tasked with educating and recruiting employers and provider agencies to participate in the TTW program by becoming Employment Networks (EN). WRI developed two SSA handbooks: The Ticket to Work Employment Network Handbook for Employers: Turning Diversity into Dollars and Employment Network Handbook for Service Providers: Grow Your Bottom Line by Putting Social Security Beneficiaries to Work. Both handbooks have been well-received by SSA.

WRI assisted the state of Florida in implementing its 2006-2009 federal Medicaid Infrastructure Grants (MIGs) to increase the number of Floridians with disabilities who become competitively employed. Activities included training and certifying trainers on WRI’s copyrighted Supported Employment curriculum, providing advanced training for certified employment specialists titled, Working with Business: The Best Practices of the Most Effective Employment Specialists, and technical assistance and training to three agencies to assist them in transitioning people from their Adult Day Training programs to community employment.

From 2007 through March 2010, more than 2,800 people, employers and service provider staff, were trained by Ms. Wilson and her staff on some facet of employment for people with disabilities.

Ms. Wilson’s company is also working with the state of Ohio MIG grant to educate job developers and service provider agencies on ways to Work with Employers to reduce the unemployment rate of Ohioans with disabilities.

From 1991-1998, Ms Wilson assisted the Oklahoma Developmental Disabilities Services Division (DDSD) to ensure the successful employment of individuals with significant disabilities. She worked with the Tulsa BLN, wrote the state’s supported employment training curriculum, trained the trainers, provided technical assistance to provider agencies, and worked with policy-makers to revamp the state’s employment rates. She also provided a graduate level Leadership and Management course to provider executives. Ms. Wilson provided job development services and was instrumental in creating Contracts with Industry, which pays employers directly for job coaching services provided by their employees. According to the 2004 State of the States in Developmental Disabilities, in fiscal year 2004, 71 percent of all day and work recipients receiving services from Oklahoma’s DDSD were in supported or competitive employment. No other state had a higher percentage; the national average was 24 percent.

Pat W. Wear, II, M.S.

Senior Vice President, Wilson Resources, Inc.

Pat Wear, II, M.S., has spent more than 30 years in service to people with disabilities. His experience in this field is broader than most other professionals. He has worked as a state agency Commissioner for Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse, executive director of a federal court-appointed panel to oversee the closure of a state institution, a staff member of a protection and advocacy agency, a paid advocate within the Arc movement, and a provider agency executive.

Today, Mr. Wear is senior vice president of Wilson Resources, Inc. and is responsible for promoting Rest-Assured, web-based technology to support persons with disabilities in their homes, respecting individual rights, promoting independence and maximizing scarce resources, and fulfilling WRI’s contract training obligations in Ohio and other states related to working with employers.

Prior to this position, he was the Kentucky Commissioner for Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse. In his stint as commissioner he oversaw a staff of 3,920, the state’s community based service network, four psychiatric hospitals and four large public ICFs for people with developmental disabilities. Mr. Wear introduced “Best Practice” as the service standard for Kentucky’s 14 Regional Mental Health and Mental Retardation Boards and created the first “Commissioner’s Awards for Best Practice in Service Provision.” He also initiated a statewide Crisis Stabilization System for adults with developmental disabilities living in the community to prevent institutionalization.

As Florida’s Acting Director and Program Director of the Advocacy Center for Persons with Disabilities, Florida’s federally-authorized protection and advocacy agency, Mr. Wear oversaw numerous programs that addressed legal needs of persons with developmental, mental health and physical disabilities. This included monitoring and enforcement of federal accessibility statutes like the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act.
Mr. Wear also coordinated the activities of a federal court appointed panel overseeing the closure of Oklahoma’s Hissom Memorial Center. Mr. Wear was responsible for assuring the successful transition of 1,060 class members with disabilities from Hissom and other ICFs. The institution closed six months ahead of schedule. As executive director of the Homeward Bound Review Panel, Mr. Wear directly reported to federal Judge James O. Ellison and panel members. Every class member was successfully moved to three person or fewer homes in their communities with an emphasis on integrated employment and day services.

The Hissom Outcomes Study, by James Conroy, Ph.D., an independent investigator, found that the partnership between the federal court and the state of Oklahoma immensely benefited the Hissom class members. “This partnership has led to some major accomplishments that are unprecedented in this or any other country,” the report said. Mr. Wear assisted the state of Oklahoma in developing a system of high quality community services. Specifically, he played a role in program design to assure community inclusion in residential and employment services, programmatic and fiscal oversight monitoring, and person-centered quality assurance.

As the CEO of an Illinois service provider, Mr. Wear’s agency received an award from the State of Illinois with the University of Illinois for its outstanding Supported Employment Program.

Mr. Wear is a certified Mental Health First Aid Instructor, Kepner Tregoe’s Managing Organizational Change and Problem Solving and Decision Making Instructor, and Working with Employers: Best Practices of the Most Successful Employment Specialists instructor.

In April 2010, Mr. Wear will receive Berea College’s Alumni Lifetime Service Award.