Ashley Schahfer

Ashley Schahfer
She / Her
Bend, OR

Her love of the outdoors, combined with 19-years of experience with disability, a Masters in Architecture, and a passion for equity and inclusion — her life mission has become thoughtful experience-based design and inclusion in all built environments, indoors and out, starting with the mind. As the founder of Empowering Access, she does disability inclusion assessments, planning, and design.

She has served on the Governor’s Task Force on Outdoor Recreation, is currently a member of the City of Bend Accessibility Advisory Committee, and has sat on many other committees assuring disability be included in the conversation. Her most recent project was developing Oregon Health and Outdoor Initiative’s new Accessibility Toolkit for land managers, where she focused on assisting land managers in shifting to a more equitable lens where ADA is removed as the focus and inclusion and creative thinking are central to access.