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Stacey Park Milbern (May 19, 1987 – May 19, 2020) was a Korean-American disability justice activist. She helped create the Disability Justice movement and advocated for fair treatment of disabled people.
Milbern began serving in disability rights leadership roles at 16 years old, including as Community Outreach Director for the National Youth Leadership Network. She later was a founder of the North Carolina Youth Leadership Forum and Disabled Young People's Collective to empower youth with disabilities to engage in advocacy and leadership. She was appointed by the Governor of North Carolina to the North Carolina Commission for the Blind from 2006 to 2008 and to the Statewide Independent Living Council from 2004 to 2010. She was instrumental in the writing and passing of the 2007 North Carolina law establishing October as "Disability History and Awareness Month" and requiring disability history curriculum to be taught in all schools. In 2005, Milbern helped to establish the disability justice movement through conversations with other disabled queer women of color activists.
Milbern authored a popular disability-rights blog on WordPress throughout the late 2000s, titled "Crip Chick" (later CripChick.com). She graduated from Methodist University in 2009.
In 2014, Milbern was appointed by Barack Obama to the President's Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities. She advised the Obama administration for two years.
Milbern earned a master of business administration degree from Mills College in 2015.
In early March 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic spread to the Bay Area, Milbern and four friends constituting the Disability Justice Culture Club distributed homemade disease-prevention kits, including hand sanitizer, disinfectant, and respirators, to residents of Oakland homeless encampments. She raised concerns for the well-being of the community and its most vulnerable members. Milbern noted her DIY solution as an example of "crip—or crippled—wisdom". She warned that the pandemic's demands on health services threatened her community's access to Kidney dialysis and other life-saving treatments needed by some to survive. Her group also organized a Benefit society campaign, providing food and care support for disabled people in need. Milbern continued pandemic relief work despite her own growing health problems.
Milbern will be honored on a U.S. quarter in 2025, as part of the final year of the American Women quarters program.
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