Neubert, Robbie , age 26, of Hamilton,died Wednesday, October 24, 2007 in Children's Hospital Cincinnati, Ohio. He was born third son of Robert and Sheila Neubert. At age 4 months he began having severe seizures round the clock and near instantaneous profound mental retardation and developmental disability, chronic illnesses, and neuromuscular skeletal issues due to muscle weakness and subdued motor ability. Robbie went to an institution just before one year of age, and the family visited him frequently during the week and took him home nearly every weekend for Friday, Saturday and Sunday overnight with his family for 9-1/2 years. At age three he was found to have a never reported before worldwide chromosome abnormality with no medical precedence or prognosis to follow. Through his family's ongoing advocacy Robbie came back home to live October 19, 1991. He is the first and still the only person in the history of Ohio where the institutional money followed him back home to provide in home supports which was what the family had sought in the first place to keep him home and out of an institution. He came home institutional bed and all, and continued to sleep in his institutional bed in his family's home until his recent death. Six years ago Robbie assisted his family and the BCARC to take a leadership role as a Positive Change Agent to reform and refund the MRDD system in Ohio. Several thousand joined this lead all over Ohio resulting in the largest disability rally on the State House Lawn in the history of Ohio. This culminated in HB94/405 and SB191, some 140 new pages of Ohio Law and some 50 new Ohio Regulations. At age 26 Robbie still had a mental age of 1-1/2 years and required total assistance in all daily living activities. He never sat up, crawled or fed himself. He expressed him self by his responses and baby like communications. For all he could not do for himself he had a profound positive impact on all who would dare to get to know him. He was a giver of self esteem, character and values. Until his death he continued to get contact by those who had taken care of him, as far back as his institutional days. We have grown greatly by Robbie's gifts to us, and will miss and value his life and those Robbie brought into our live by necessity, as long as we live. He is survived by his parents, two brothers, Christopher and Michael Neubert. He was preceded in death by grandparents, Ruth and Robert Neubert and Mack and Oma McClintock.

Funeral services Celebration of Robbie's Life will be held at 7:00pm Monday in St. Ann Church Pleasant Ave. at Hooven Ave., Hamilton, OH Visitation will be from 4-6:30pm Monday in the Zettler Funeral Home 2646 Pleasant Ave. There will be a eulogy at the end of the visitation and all are invited to express what Robbie's life and knowing his family, a child with a severe rare chronic illness, meant to you. Reception after service at St. Ann's
Pot Luck bring cold finger foods, snacks and drinks if you like, help clean up.

If you cannot attend in a few days you may express yourself at this web site www.zettlerfuneralhome.com Burial will Tuesday October 30, 2007
10:00 AM in St. Alloysius Cemetery, Shandon, Ohio.

Donations can be given in your local community in Robbie's Name, or to
The Butler County ARC, in Robbie's Name
282 North Fair Avenue
Hamilton, Ohio 45014

Donations will be used for: 1.) Advocacy of persons with Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities (MRDD) of which the BCARC has shown state wide leadership and effectiveness and the ability to hold major stakeholders accountable to the individual and family, 2.) The BCARC will donate a portion to local National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI ) chapters to advocate for the Mentally Ill and their families, and 3.) BCARC will donate a portion to the Butler County Co-op, a collaboration between local providers, persons receiving services, their circle of supports and family, the Butler County Board of MRDD, and other stakeholders to promote quality of life – quality that cannot be defined and ensured by paper driven check lists and audits.

OR, you can volunteer your time becoming party to surrounding a person with MRDD or MH in your community with those who care and who can, participate in strengthening local ARC and NAMI chapter organizations the structure of which provides a point of contact and referral, information, resources and advocacy support. The strength of these local chapters and involvement in constantly changing public and governmental support at the local state and federal level provides the political will and clout for the State Chapters to more effectively deal with the lobbying special interests of the various trade organizations and agencies who have control over and benefit significantly from the monies intended to serve the persons the MRDD and MH systems were created for. Otherwise the State level advocacy groups are sorely outnumbered by paid lobbyists and state agencies. Your local involvement and efforts bubble up to become the conscience for the change that constantly goes on in these programs. To find your local chapter http://www.thearcofohio.org http://www.thearc.org http://www.nami.org http://www.namiohio.org http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=your_local_NAMI&Template=/CustomSource/LocalDetail.cfm&localID=0001711980&fromHL=no&state=oh