[MD-AtLarge] Chapter Minutes and Reminder

Mon May 11 17:29:29 UTC 2015

Hi All, 

Remember our meeting will be Tuesday May 19.  

Minutes for the At large chapter of the National Federation of the Blind of
Maryland

Date: Tuesday, April 21, 2015

The meeting was called to order at 8:00 P.M. via conference call by Sharon
Maneki. There were around 20 people on the call.

We had a special guest for the call; the president of the National
Federation of the Blind, Mark Riccobono. Everyone introduced and told him
something about themselves.

President Riccobono said sometimes it can feel like individual efforts are
small and do not accomplish much, but putting many individual efforts
together can accomplish a great deal. He said this is what's unique about
the federation.

President Riccobono told us about himself. He told us he lost his sight as a
child and was introduced to the NFB in High School. He was told he should
learn Braille, but he felt this was unnecessary, so he declined. He went on
to college and had a tough time.

He attended his first NFB national convention in 1996, where he first began
to truly learn about the federation. He said it is still fun to learn what
the federation can do.

President Riccobono met his wife, Melissa, in college, where he served as
her student mentor. He invited her to join the federation, and they both
became very active. He said they had many ideas for bettering things for
people which have become reality. For instance, they saw a need for more
Braille books for kids, which are now available at the Braille book fair
each year at national convention.

Mark and Melissa came to Baltimore 11 years ago and have 3 children. He
succeeded Marc Maurer as president of the federation in 2014. He said the
federation has taught him that blindness isn't what defines him and doesn't
have to keep him from learning what he wants to.

He shared a story with us about a woman he recently spoke to from Detroit.
She lost her sight in 2009 and has not left her apartment since. Although
she is 82, he said she sounded like she still had a lot of life left in her.
However, she is afraid she will end up in a nursing home because she does
not know how to cope with her loss of vision. Although she was unfamiliar
with the resources and services available to her, she had heard of the
federation and recently made a large monetary contribution in hopes that it
would help others. She is now being made aware of the services that are
available and people are looking into what can be done for her. President
Riccobono said this is why he does what he does; people like that woman
still need to be reached.

He told us he had just had a two-hour meeting just concerning legal issues;
he said "We hire a lot of lawyers to sue a lot of people, but we're the only
ones doing it."; we're the only group fighting for the rights of blind
people.

Concerning the at large chapter, he said it is good to be able to keep up
with the federation this way and see how we can contribute.

He encouraged everyone to come to this year's national convention in
Orlando, Florida. He said there is a goal at convention to break the world
record for number of people holding umbrellas. The current record is 2,169,
which he said should be easy to break. He said this is something that will
be fun but will also raise awareness of the federation.

National convention is July 5-10. Preregistration for discounted rates lasts
until the end of May.

In answer to a question about what exactly his job is, he said he is the CEO
of the federation; he is in charge of hiring, training, and firing staff,
helping formulate policies and programs, authorizing expenditures from the
treasury and finding funding. He said his number one job is building the
federation.

Charles brought up the topic of blind celebrities. President Riccobono said
there are not many of them, and they have not had to struggle for things the
way most blind people have. He said they would like to make a movie about
Jacob Bolotin, who was a blind doctor and, though many would like him to be
portrayed by a blind actor, there aren't any famous blind actors, and it
would be better if a more well-known actor played him to draw more awareness
to the film. He said these are the kinds of issues that come up with blind
celebrities so it's a balancing act.

Sharon Haskins-Brown said she did a commercial for BISM, and she has had
many people tell her they do not know about blindness or what services are
available. President Riccobono said there is a lot of literature available
for people to share with others, and if there is any literature people think
need to be added let the federation know. Sharon Maneki said we can go over
some of the literature at our next meeting so we know what's available, and
it can be mailed to anyone who wants to give it out. She said that might be
a good project for the at large chapter.

President Riccobono said the goal for the 75th year of the federation is to
get 750 new members. This sounds like a lot but, as we've already discussed,
there are a lot of people who don't know about us.

He said commercials and national campaigns cost more money than we want to
spend to raise awareness, but a lot has been done on the internet including
a YouTube channel. He said the tools are available to make videos but ideas
are needed for what videos should be made and people are needed to be in
them. Anyone interested in viewing the YouTube channel can find it at
www.youtube.com/nationsblind.

He said the idea for a blind reality show has been raised many times,
including one recently that would have followed a blind couple raising
children, but there are many concerns about such a project. You don't get to
control the message that is presented, and real life is not what is wanted
as much as drama. He gave the example that if a child of a blind person got
hurt, it would be blown out of proportion, even though children always get
hurt.

Judy Rasmussen shared a story that ran in the Braille Monitor about a
chapter in New Mexico that prepared a video to share with the local police
department to inform them about blindness.

President Riccobono told us about the Center for Excellence, which is in the
beginning stages. It is a program more than an actual physical place. They
just received $250,000 for it, and it will be geared toward improving
accessibility in technology.

Sharon announced that the nominating committee for our chapter includes Judy
Rasmussen, who is the chair, as well as Marla Sewell and Cheryl Fogal-Hatch.
Anyone who would like to be considered for a position should call Judy at
301-946-8345 before the next meeting, which is when voting will be held.

The meeting ended at 9:00 P.M.

Submitted by Danielle Shives

Sharon Maneki, President

National Federation of the Blind of Maryland

410-715-9596

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://nfbnet.org/pipermail/md-atlarge_nfbnet.org/attachments/20150511/098f2442/attachment.html>