Welcome to MOPD All Access! In this interview, MOPD Commissioner Rachel Arfa sat down with Chief Executive Officer of the Obama Foundation, Valerie Jarrett, to discuss the opening of the Obama Presidential Center, and how the Obama Foundation championed accessibility throughout the Obama Presidential Museum and Center, establishing innovative new standards for accessibility in our City and nationwide.

Visual Description:

Opening image is the MOPD All Access logo, displaying a blue square next to a red star and the letters MOPD in black bold text at the bottom of the screen, followed by the words All Access. The screen then opens at the Obama Presidential Library, from the President's Reading Room. The background shows carefully curated books on light wood bookshelves, along with photographs displayed on some shelves.

MOPD Commissioner Rachel Arfa opens the interview. She is wearing a light teal pantsuit with a white blouse and a pearl string necklace. She has brown hair in a half curl and hazel eyes.

CEO Valerie Jarrett is wearing a pastel blue pantsuit with matching blouse, a two-string silver necklace with gemstones, and transparent clear glasses Her brown hair is in a perfectly coiffed bob with a soft wave and she has brown eyes.

The screen rotates from showing Commissioner Arfa or CEO Jarrett while each speaks. Jennifer McElroy, ASL interpreter, is visible at the bottom right of the screen in an A-frame outline. Jennifer is wearing a hunter green dress with matching large green eye glasses and a short brown pixie-like haircut. A black bar is along the bottom of the screen viewed horizontally and displays captions in white font. At the top left corner, the MOPD logo is visible in white.

At minute 9:54, a photograph is displayed. The photograph shows CEO Jarrett, Commissioner Arfa, Leah Katz-Hernandez, Claudia Gordon and Maria Town at the Obama Center on John Lewis Plaza on opening day, Juneteenth, 2026. Maria is holding up a royal blue fan with white lettering displaying the Obama Center logo. The Forum building is in the background, along with other people moving around and a portion of a white tent. The mood is happy and joyous.

As the interview closes, the same image displayed at the start is shown again.

On October 15, the MOPD All Access Podcast had its second live show. For this episode, we welcomed content creators and disability advocates Yare Tua and Natasha Caudill to take the stage for a conversation.

Yare and Natasha are Chicago-based content creators who talk about their disabilities in content they make for YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and more. As part of National Disability Employment Awareness Month, Yare and Natasha talked about their own career paths, using their platforms, and what advice they might have for anyone interested in creating content.

Stream podcast audio at mopdallaccess.podbean.com or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow MOPD at mopdchicago on X, Facebook, Instagram and connect with us on LinkedIn.

This podcast was recorded on October 15, 2025 at Central West Community Center, 2102 West Ogden Avenue.

In 2024, the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities launched a new project to help people in Chicago with disabilities from gun and community violence. At our Gun Violence Awareness event this past June, gun and community violence survivors and anti-violence advocates shared their powerful stories and MOPD was able to highlight some of the community-based organizations who are working with survivors every day.

On this episode of the MOPD All Access Podcast, we share part of that conversation, but first, Christina and Lauren talk to Porcia Seals, the coordinator of the Disabled Survivors of Gun and Community Violence Project, and Clare Stanhope, training officer, about their experiences working on the project.

At the end of the episode, high school student Sky Sims from Young Authors Chicago shares an original poem she wrote called “Grief is a Windy City.”

Learn more about MOPD’s Disabled Survivors of Gun and Community Violence Project here: https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/mopd/supp_info/gun-violence-disability-chicago.html

Stream podcast audio at mopdallaccess.podbean.com or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow MOPD at mopdchicago on X, Facebook, Instagram and connect with us on LinkedIn.