Walter Stockton was born, raised and educated in Pennsylvania – but Long Island is his home and, thanks to his efforts, home to thousands of developmentally disabled Islanders who might otherwise wind up in an institutional horror house, or worse.

The founder of the Independent Group Home Living Program – and now the Kinexion Network, an umbrella management-service organization for a half-dozen major league Long Island nonprofits – has led a decades-long charge to improve professional services and residential opportunities for the developmentally disabled. And he’s done it through the teeth of recessions, pandemics and an ever-changing political climate.

In today’s episode, the master innovator joins Spark host Gregory Zeller to discuss five decades of progress for himself, his circa-1978 startup and Long Island’s most vulnerable residents – and his brightest assessment of new innovative opportunities ahead.