[Blindtlk] Oregon votes to close school for the blind

[Steve P. Deeley]

You are maintaining a complete campus for  31 students.  There is something 
known as cost efficiency.  I believe the days for schools for the blind are 
just about over.  In the 1960's, the Kentucky School for the Blind had a 
census of 150 or more.  Now, there are very few blind students on the 
campus.  In the day, KSB had one of the most respected wrestling teams in 
the state of Kentucky.  Those days seem to be gone, sadly.

Steve
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "T. Joseph Carter" <carter.tjoseph at gmail.com>
To: "Blind Talk Mailing List" <blindtlk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Thursday, June 11, 2009 8:39 AM
Subject: Re: [Blindtlk] Oregon votes to close school for the blind


> Full time students?  31.
>
> Served each year in some capacity?  About 400.
>
> Twenty years ago?  I don't know, it was a lot more—but Oregon has
> changed its laws in the interim to forbid placement at the school
> unless there is no other placement possible.
>
> The school is being closed for students that are only allowed to be
> there because there is no other placement possible.
>
> The first argument to close the school was that the buildings needed
> substantial maintenance, including seismic upgrades.  We countered
> this by pointing out that funding for this maintenance has been
> secured time and again, but the Oregon legislature has consistently
> redirected it over the past 20 years to efforts to close or relocate
> the school, rather than maintain it.  Consistently, as in every
> single time.  They dropped that argument.
>
> The next argument was that enrollment was down and the cost per
> student was extremely high.  They argued that Least Restrictive
> Environment forbade placement at the school.  It would save money,
> too!  We gave the correct definition of LRE and pointed out that
> counting costs for 400 and dividing them by 31 is outright deception.
> We also pointed out how much closing the school would cost elsewhere.
> They mostly dropped that argument.
>
> The following argument was an empassioned plea to save these poor
> children from a life of seclusion.  Those poor children came and told
> the legislature that they were not secluded, that they had no other
> chance at the same education anywhere else in Oregon, and that they
> needed this school.  Another argument down.
>
> Finally, the legislature abandoned any pretense of arguing that this
> was "for the sake of the children" because we'd proven it was not.
> They stopped pretending that it would save money, because it would
> not.
>
> The effort to close the school was put forward by Oregon Democrats,
> and they maintain a strong majority in the Oregon legislature.  So
> they crammed it through with little public comment, offering
> minimally required time for an amendment to be published before it
> was voted on (without public comment, of course), and then they
> pulled every shenanigan they could to try and escape public notice,
> since the public almost unanimously opposed this bill.
>
> Joseph
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 11, 2009 at 07:18:26AM -0400, Steve P. Deeley wrote:
>> How many blind children were currently enrolled in the school in 2008?
>> How many blind students did the school have 20 years ago?
>> Steve
>
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