Lex Frieden
Chairman of the Board
United Spinal Association

Lex Frieden is one of America’s pre-eminent disability activists and leaders of the independent living movement. He is Professor of Health Informatics and of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. He is also Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at Baylor College of Medicine.

From 2002 to 2006, he served as Chairman of the National Council on Disability (NCD), a presidentially appointed body. He was the 1998 winner of the prestigious Henry B. Betts Award for outstanding achievement in disability rights. In 1983, he was recognized as one of the Ten Outstanding Young Americans.

As Senior Vice President of TIRR|MemorialHermann Hospital (formerly Texas Institute for Rehabilitation and Research) in Houston, Frieden directs the Independent Living Research Utilization (ILRU) program at TIRR.

Frieden was one of the major figures behind the enactment of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990. In his capacity of Executive Director of NCD in the mid-1980s, reporting to presidentially appointed Council members notably including Vice Chairman Justin Dart, Frieden oversaw the work of Robert Burgdorf in writing the first drafts of what was to become the ADA. The Council issued a major report, Toward Independence, to further the effort along. The ADA became law on July 26, 1990.

Frieden’s service in the 1970s included membership on a task force empaneled by Olin E. ("Tiger") Teague (1910-1981), U.S. Congressman from Texas, to study what was and was not being done in disability-related research across the entire swath of the U.S. Government. That panel’s work led, in 1978, to creation of the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR), a unit of the US Department of Education.

Lex Frieden was born in Alva, Oklahoma, a town in northwestern Oklahoma. In 1967, he began studying elecrical engineering at Oklahoma State University. It was as a freshman that he sustained a spinal cord injury in an automobile accident. As part of his rehabilitation from that injury, he went to TIRR in Houston, where he met Dr. William A. Spencer, the great rehabilitation medicine visionary. Dr. Spencer became Lex’s mentor. Among many other things, Spencer brought Lex onto the Teague-appointed research panel that Spencer chaired.

Frieden is a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of Tulsa and also a graduate of the University of Houston. In 2004, he was awarded an honorary doctorate in law (LL.D.) by the National University of Ireland.

Paul Tobin
President and Chief Executive Officer
United Spinal Association

Paul J. Tobin was unanimously appointed President and Chief Executive Officer of United Spinal Association in June 2006. He served as Deputy Executive Director from July 2003 and was a member of the Board of Directors from 1995 to 1996.

Tobin, a United States Navy veteran, oversees all strategic operations of the organization and ensures the execution of United Spinal’s mission and vision. In addition to his tour as Deputy Executive Director, Tobin has held a variety of managerial positions, including Hospital Services Officer, Director of Special Projects, and Group Director of Benefit Services. He was promoted to Associate Executive Director of Benefit Services in 1998.

A Long Island native, Tobin graduated from Manhattan College with a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering in 1991. Upon graduation, Tobin attended the United States Navy Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island, from which he was commissioned an ensign in November, 1991 and joined the Civil Engineering Corps. With the CEC, Tobin was stationed at Naval Air Warfare Center in Lakehurst, New Jersey.

After sustaining a spinal cord injury in August of 1993, Tobin underwent rehabilitation at the Castle Point (NY) Veterans Affairs Medical Center. Tobin has also pursued a Masters degree in Public Health Administration at Columbia University and is currently pursuing a Masters degree in Social Work at Fordham University.

Tobin stresses the tradition of service that is the legacy of United Spinal Association and, as president and CEO, urges our membership and individuals with disabilities everywhere to continually challenge the limitations imposed by attitudes, medical technology, society, and government.

Officers
Lex Frieden – Chairman of the Board
Denise A. Mc Quade – Vice Chairman of the Board
Michael B. Kinne – Secretary
Janeen Earwood – Treasurer
Paul J. Tobin – President and Chief Executive Officer

Board of Directors