The document we are accountable to.
Most mission organizations write a mission statement. We wrote a charter. It defines what voice impairment means in two different registers — the experience that puts you in the tribe, and the medical/legal definition we are pushing into ADA code. It names the communities we hold a door open for. It names the framing we refuse to use. And it lists the five structural commitments we will never break. This is the document we are accountable to — internally and publicly.
Two definitions. Two jobs.
A movement needs a definition for who's in it. A civil-rights category needs a definition for what gets recognized in law. These are not the same question — and we answer both.
Voice impairment is when a person tries to be heard and the world can't understand them.
Defined by experience, not diagnosis. Self-identified, not assigned. Cause is irrelevant — stroke, autism, ALS, late-deafening, cerebral palsy, brain injury, apraxia, dysarthria, selective mutism, late-stage dementia, traumatic injury, lifelong condition, or anything else. Same wall. This is the definition that decides who's in the tribe. It's used on the homepage, in brand language, and at the door we hold open at street level.
"Voice impairment" refers to a medically recognized condition that substantially limits a person's ability to speak, be understood, or communicate effectively, including conditions such as stroke, aphasia, ALS, cerebral palsy, apraxia, and related disorders.
Modeled on 42 USC § 12102, the ADA's existing definition of disability — so voice impairment slots into the civil-rights framework already in force rather than fights it. This is the version we hand to state senators, town counsel, ADA Coordinators, civil-rights attorneys, and into any proposed statute or municipal code.
The two definitions do not conflict. The experiential definition is who's in the movement. The medical/legal definition is who's protected by law. Both are true at once.
A line we draw with care.
Voice impairment is not the same as deafness. Capital-D Deaf people who use ASL fluently are a linguistic and cultural community with their own civil-rights tradition, their own leaders, and their own language. ASL is a complete native language; it is not a deficit. We do not claim Deaf identity, Deaf history, or Deaf advocacy as ours.
At the same time, the operational definition above — when a person tries to be heard and the world can't understand them — covers a real population that overlaps with deafness. Oral deaf people who try to speak vocally and aren't understood. Late-deafened adults whose speech changes. Hard-of-hearing folks who try to be heard at a counter and can't. These individuals are in the tribe by their own experience, not by our assignment.
The line, in one sentence: The door is open. We do not pull anyone in. We do not speak for any community. People speak for themselves.
The tribe, as currently named.
This list will evolve as constituent communities weigh in. Names are listed in the form each community generally prefers — identity-first or person-first.
The autistic community generally prefers identity-first language ("autistic individuals"). Stroke, aphasia, CP, and brain-injury communities generally prefer person-first ("stroke survivors," "people with aphasia"). AAC users say "AAC users." We use what each community asks us to use. This is not a stylistic choice; it is a respect choice.
Five things we will never do.
These are not aspirations. They are written into our founding documents. They are written into customer contracts. Breaking any one of them is grounds for the alliance to be dissolved.
We will never sell, license, or transfer user data to third parties.
The communities we serve have already had too many things sold out from under them. Their voices, their conversations, their identities — none of it is for sale. Not for analytics partnerships. Not for "anonymized research." Not under any acquisition. Ever.
We will never monetize the people we serve through ads, profiling, or data brokering.
No advertising on the products. No behavioral profiling. No surveillance disguised as analytics. Our users are not the product. The towns and businesses that pay us are the customers. The users are the people we serve.
We will never be acquired by any entity that won't honor these commitments.
If AgeWell Alliance is ever sold, the buyer must contractually honor every commitment in this charter, in perpetuity. If they won't, the sale doesn't happen. The mission outranks the founders.
We will dedicate revenue from products to fund advocacy and coalition work.
The TinkySpeak / TinkyTown / AgeWell Compliance product line exists to fund the mission. A portion of revenue is permanently dedicated to advocacy, coalition organizing, and direct support of the constituent communities. We don't ask for donations to fund the work. The work funds itself.
We are building shared governance with lived-experience leaders from the constituent communities.
Right now this is a verb, not a noun. We do not yet have shared governance — and we will not pretend that we do. We are building it. The structure, timeline, and seats are being designed with community organizers from inside the named communities, not for them. When it is in place, this section will be updated to reflect what was built.
Words we do not say.
A civil-rights organization is judged by its language as much as its laws. These are framings we have committed to never using — internally or publicly.
Who holds us to this.
This charter is a living document. The signed version, with revision history, is maintained at AgeWell Alliance's headquarters at 82 Griswold Drive, West Hartford, Connecticut. Material changes are versioned and dated below.
We are accountable to: the people inside the communities we name, the lived-experience organizers who will share governance with us as it is built, the State of Connecticut as our incorporating jurisdiction, the towns and businesses that pay us for products, the Connecticut State ADA Coordinator's office that validated our work, and to the civil-rights movement we are asking to make room for one more category at the table.
If we break this charter, the right response is to call it out — and the right place to start is by emailing us at hello@agewellalliance.com.