From a Staff member:
As of a few weeks ago there is a new system in place for those who were disabled for inactivity: they can fill out a questionnaire and if there's no red flags on their account they'll have an option to be re-enabled via email. This process is much much faster than irc as it can be done asynchronously. 287 people have been assisted with this system in just the last 3 or so weeks since it went live. Log in to your inactive account and if you qualify you'll be shown details of how to proceed.