ADVOCACY AND PUBLIC POLICY COMMITTEE
The Advocacy and Public Policy Committee is charged with advocating on behalf of persons with ADHD and related disorders by influencing national, state, and local public policies. As a committee, we monitor legislation and regulatory agencies as they relate to ADHD, particularly in the justice and educational systems, civil rights, employment and healthcare. The committee is goal-oriented, establishing legislative priorities that we wish to influence, and responding to concerns as they develop.
Ingrid Y. Alpern, JD, LLM in Tax, Co-Chair
Ingrid Alpern practiced tax law in Washington, DC, for many years. Alpern has helped to raised awareness about ADHD and provides support to families coping with ADHD through her long-term work as a volunteer for CHADD and as a Parent to Parent teacher. She also serves on CHADD’s Finance Committee. Alpern brings to CHADD the expertise she developed as a tax attorney in legal research and writing and analysis of complex matters.
Jeffrey S. Katz, PhD, Co-Chair
Jeffrey Katz is a clinical psychologist in private practice in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Katz has been involved with CHADD for many years. In addition to the public policy committee, Katz also serves on CHADD’s professional advisory board and is a past member of the board of directors. Katz specializes in the evaluation and treatment of children, adolescents and adults with an emphasis on ADHD, as well as other behavioral and learning issues. Katz frequently attends school meetings, bringing his knowledge of ADHD, learning disabilities, and school-based interventions together with his knowledge of educational regulations to ensure that students receive the support they need. Katz also serves on the Disabilities Advisory Committee of Tidewater Community College, Virginia, sharing his expertise with their office of educational accessibility.
Vincent Buttaci, JD
Vincent N. Buttaci, JD, is a member of Buttaci Leardi & Werner LLC, a boutique health law firm with offices in New Jersey and New York. He focuses his practice on representing nonprofit and for-profit behavioral health facilities and health systems in all aspects of care delivery, access, and reimbursement. Additionally, he has nearly twenty-five years of experience representing nonprofit healthcare associations in matters of advocacy, legislative action, and public policy reform. While in law school, Buttaci struggled with undiagnosed adult ADHD and later learned about coping with neurodiversity. His experience spurred him to establish the Wellness in Career Program at The Ohio State University Michael E. Moritz College of Law, which provides workshops to law students on building self-awareness and addressing time management, stress, and anxiety. He first became involved with CHADD after his daughter’s ADHD diagnosis and is thrilled to join the board of directors to support the organization’s ongoing mission.
Cindy Goldrich, EdM, ADHD-CCSP
Cindy Goldrich, EdM, ADHD-CCSP, is a board-certified ADHD coach. She specializes in providing education, coaching, and support for parents, educators, and mental health professionals to help children with ADHD and executive function deficits succeed at home, in school, and in life. She received her master’s degree in education in counseling psychology from Columbia University. She is the creator of the Calm and Connected: Parenting Children with ADHD series and the author of 8 Keys to Parenting Children with ADHD. She provides professional development workshops and presentations nationwide. She previously served on the editorial advisory board for CHADD’s Attention magazine.
Matthew J. Gormley, PhD
Matthew Gormley is an assistant professor in the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Gormley is a school psychologist and his research focuses on supporting students at-risk for or diagnosed with ADHD. He is specifically interested in interventions that build collaboration among families, schools, and healthcare settings to support students with ADHD across their academic careers. Gormley received CHADD’s Young Scientist Research Award in 2017.
Jane Indergaard, DNP, RN
Jane Indergaard, DNP, RN, E-TNS, is an associate professor of nursing at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota, and a licensed registered nurse in North Dakota and Minnesota. Her forty-plus years of clinical and teaching experience spans critical care, emergency trauma, research/evidence-based practice, and behavioral health nursing. Dr. Indergaard is a recognized speaker, budding author, and long-standing provider of education, advocacy, and outreach for individuals living with ADHD. She is the local co-founder of the award-winning Red River Valley CHADD, an affiliate of CHADD. She also serves on the editorial advisory board for CHADD’s Attention magazine. Her interest in worldwide behavioral health collaboration has led to international presentations and the development of global health initiatives for advancing nursing practice, nursing education, and behavioral health care outreach for programs in Africa and China. She is currently co-leader for undergraduate interdisciplinary exploration of behavioral health service research and delivery in the United Kingdom. Dr. Indergaard’s current research and clinical interests focus on the impact of hormonal fluctuations on women with ADHD, neurocognitive disorders and ADHD, clinical practice guidelines for adult ADHD, and the design and implementation of psychoeducational programming into provider treatment for ADHD.
Trenton Ullrich, MPA
Trenton Ullrich, MPA, is an associate at High Lantern Group’s New York City office. He supports clients across various industries, including in healthcare and patient advocacy. Before joining HLG, Ullrich worked in government and politics, providing communications and organizing support to elected officials and candidates for public office. His work helped elect more than a dozen state and local candidates across New York during the 2019, 2020, and 2022 election cycles. Ullrich holds a master of public administration degree concentrating in public policy from Cornell University. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in government and politics from St. John’s University, where he wrote for the university’s student newspaper.
Mary V. Solanto, PhD
Mary Solanto is Professor of Pediatrics and Psychiatry at the Hofstra-Northwell School of Medicine, Long Island, NY. She received her doctorate in Clinical Psychology from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She completed an NIMH post-doctoral fellowship in the Department of Psychiatry at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. She is a former director of the ADHD Center in the Department of Psychiatry at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, and an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the NYU School of Medicine. In 2017-2018, Dr. Solanto was a Fulbright US Scholar in the Netherlands, where she taught undergraduates and conducted research on the treatment of ADHD in college students. Dr. Solanto’s research on the cognitive and behavioral functioning of children with ADHD, the effects of psychostimulants, and the characteristics of the subtypes of ADHD has been supported by grants from NIMH, NICHD, and NINDS. Dr. Solanto developed a novel cognitive-behavioral intervention to target problems of executive self-management in adults with ADHD, which was the focus of an NIMH-sponsored treatment efficacy study. It was published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.
Dr. Solanto has published scholarly papers and books about ADHD in children and adults. She is a frequent reviewer for professional journals, and has served on study section/grant review panels for NIMH. The manual for therapists, Cognitive-Behavioral Treatment of Adult ADHD: Targeting Executive Dysfunction, was published by Guilford Press. The program was recognized by CHADD as an Innovative Program of the Year. Dr. Solanto also edited, with Amy Arnsten and Xavier Castellanos, Stimulant Drugs and ADHD: Basic and Clinical Neuroscience. Currently, she is a member of the editorial boards of the Journal of Attention Disorders, and the ADHD Report.
Dr. Solanto serves on the professional advisory boards of CHADD, National Center for Learning Disabilities, and the American Professional Society of ADHD and Related Disorders.
M. Jeffry Spahr, MBA, JD
Jeffry Spahr is an attorney in Norwalk, Connecticut. Spahr is president of the Connecticut Association of Children and Adults with Learning Disabilities. He has been the driving force behind the Connecticut governor's annually declaring an ADHD Awareness Week in the state. He also founded the Association of Parents of Exceptional Children and Siblings to assist parents in his state in coping with the legal and academic challenges they face for their children.
