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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal>Good evening fellow Federationists and All listers,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Earlier this evening John Paré, Director of Strategic Initiatives, and Anil Lewis, Director of Strategic Communications, convened a teleconference call in follow up to the 2012 Washinggton Seminar and I had the proud pleasure of representing Kansas on this important follow-up call. Here is a topical summary of what transpired tonight.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>•HOUSE BIL 3086. There are currently 44 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives on HB3086, titled the Fair Wages For Workers With Disabilities Act. This is double the number of co-sponsors we had at the start of the Washington Seminar, but there is a fly in the ointment. There were 46 co-sponsors until Representative Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania and Barney Frank of Massachusetts withdrew their support of the bill, capitulating to pressure from the powerful and highly compensated sheltered workshop lobbyists. Unfortunately, neither Thompson nor Frank gave any explanations for withdrawal of their co-sponsorship commitments.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>The sheltered workshop lobby has circulated a flyer to House members with the headliner “Wwhere will Samy Go?” Imlied in this proplaganda piece is the argument that if the sheltered employment centers are forced to comply with Federal minimum wage requirements they will be forced to close their doors, leaving hundreds of thousands of pitiful disabled people with nothing to do but sit around, collect their government benefit checks while twittling their thumbgs day after sorry day. Paré informed the conferees he has issued a responsive letter protesting the exploitation of disabled Americans and pretending to know what is in our best interest, and to speak for those who have a right to speak for themselves.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Both Anil Lewis and John Paré requests us us to take the time to contact our co-sponsoring House members and thank them for their support of fair wages for the blind and all disabled wokkers, especially those co-sponsors in our state or Congressional districts. A List of co-sponsors is comeing to a listserv near you. At this time there are no sponsors in the Senate, but governmental affairs office staff are busily engaged in follow-up conversations with several influential senators. Staff have been meeting with the Autistic Self Advocacy Project who is also working on responses to the lobbying campaign and pressure tactics orchestrated by the sheltered employment lobbyists, and the number of participating disability rights organizations is increasing in this all important endeavor.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Anil Lewis is calling on us to bring him more stories by or about those who have worked in sheltered shops under the burden of subminimum wages. Lewis cited the recent example of a former sheltered workshop employee who worked a subminimum wage job and is now gainfully employed by the U.S. Social Security Administration.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>• ADBOA: As of yet no bill has been introduced in either side of Congress, but there is an apparent showing of strong interest from Republicans on the proposed Americans With Disabilities Business Opportunity Act (ADBOA). Senator Olympia Snow of main and Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts drew high scores in constituent sessions during Washington Seminar. Senator Snow is a member of the Senate Small Business Committee. National office staff reports that a number of House Democraats are also showing remarkable interest in ADBOA, the primary purpose of which is to expand government contracting and subcontracting opportunities by adding disability to the list of presumed socially disadvantaged groups who wil be given opportunities to bid on contracts for the purchase of goods and services from the Federal government. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>• LaTourette Amendment. Representative ASteven C. LaTourette of Ohio introduced an amendment to the House version of the Federal interstate highway funding measure which if adopted would open up roadside food and beverage vending sites to commercial food service firms, which would abversely affect Randolph-Shepard vendors whose roadside vending salesopportunities were expanded thanks to the Kennelli Amendment to RSVA. LaTourette and several of his colleagues are wooed by and highly enamoured of the prospect of commercializing highway food and beverage sales because the government granted easements and licensing fees would generate a new source of revenue for highway construction and maingtenance. A somewhat different proposal was offered to allow states to commercialize non highway vendors, but our Governnmental Affairs staff view this as a very dangerous slippery slope that would eventually lead to full commercialization of interstate highway food vending services. Fortunately, the Senate version of the highway funding bill differs widely from the House bill and does not include language to commercialize roadside food and beverage vending.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Our National office staff urges us to Call our House members to ask them or her to oppose the LaTourette amendment. Secondly, we are urged to contact Congressman LaTourette and ask him to withdraw his amendment to the House highway funding bill. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>• NLS DIGITAL BOOKS PROJECT. Last but not least, the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS) is planning marked scale-backs of the number of titles to converted from analog to digital DAISY format from 58000 titles to about 16000, in anticipation of major reductions in its budget line item from Congress. The direct consequence of such a large scaleback is that undigitized titles will not be available in digital format. Of course cassette tapes and other analogue formats of these talking books are still available, but they are obviously not available to NLS subscribers who no longer have functioning four track cassette players or slow speed Library of Congress turn tables on which to play flexible 16 and 2 thirds RPM disks.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>As you can see, a lot of information was packed into this teleconference call which lasted approximately 45 minutes. Before I turn you loose to live life as we know it, allow me to summarize the call to arms by our indefatigable and dynamic national center staff in an easily referenced to-do list.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoListParagraph style='text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'><![if !supportLists]><span style='mso-list:Ignore'>1.<span style='font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"'> </span></span><![endif]>Call, write, fax, or email any House member who joined the growing list of co-sponsors of House Bill 3086.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoListParagraph style='text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'><![if !supportLists]><span style='mso-list:Ignore'>2.<span style='font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"'> </span></span><![endif]>IF you know of or can find anyone with a compelling story of sheltered workshop employment at less than full Federal minimum wage, please contact Anil Lewis at National Center.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoListParagraph style='text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'><![if !supportLists]><span style='mso-list:Ignore'>3.<span style='font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"'> </span></span><![endif]>Contact the House member in your Kansas Congressional district and ask himor her to advocate and vote against the LaTourette Amendment to the House version of the highway funding measure.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoListParagraph style='text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'><![if !supportLists]><span style='mso-list:Ignore'>4.<span style='font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"'> </span></span><![endif]>Contact Representative Stephen C. LaTourette and ask him to withdraw his amendment so it doesn’t come up for a vote on the House floor in the first place.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>This wa<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>s indeed a pleasure to be a part of this very powerful and informative post seminar conference call. Coming to Washington with me next year?<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Best to all,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Rob Tabor & Guide Cane Raúl Junior<o:p></o:p></p></div></body></html>