[nfbmi-talk] Fw: still digitally dived here in flint

[joe harcz Comcast]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: joe harcz Comcast 
To: blind democracy List 
Sent: Friday, September 28, 2012 2:39 PM
Subject: still digitally dived here in flint


I note this great speech and money put in to our local CIL for access and note twelve years later the Director still cannot respond to information requests in accessible format (simple Word documents) in a timely manner or hold events including the recent ADA anniversary   in a Flint Park with even raised character and Braille signs on the restrooms for crying out loud.

Joe
Source:

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/WCPD-2000-09-25/html/WCPD-2000-09-25-Pg2152.htm

 

 

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 36 Issue 38 (Monday, September 25, 2000)

[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 36, Number 38 (Monday, September 25, 2000)]

[Pages 2152-2155]

[Online from the Government Printing Office,

www.gpo.gov]

 

 

<R04>

Remarks at Mott Community College in Flint, Michigan

 

September 21, 2000

 

Give her another hand. [Applause] Wasn't she great? Thank you,

Karla.

Well, good afternoon, everyone. I am delighted to be here at Mott

Community College. And I want to begin by thanking Karla Hudson again

for her sterling example, but even more for her commitment to helping

other people build a better future for themselves.

I also want to thank my longtime friend and now Cabinet member,

Secretary Mineta, for his years and years of commitment to empowering

people with disabilities. I thank my National Economic Adviser, Gene

Sperling, who is a native of Michigan, for the work he did on the

announcements I will make today. And Mayor Stanley, thank you, as

always. Judy Brewer, thank you for your work.

I also want to acknowledge Pamela Loving from the Career Alliance

and Michael Zelley from the Disability Network for what they're doing.

I'd like to thank Dr. Shaink, the board, and the faculty members and the

students of Mott Community College for making us welcome here today.

And I'd like to acknowledge a couple of other people who came with

me today to be here--first, the remarkable president of Gallaudet

University in Washington, DC, Dr. I. King Jordan, and a marathon

runner--congratulations for being here--James Clark, vice president at

NCR; Carl Augusto, the president of the American Foundation for the

Blind; and from the administration, Judy Heumann, the Assistant

Secretary for Special Education Rehab Services, and Jonathan Young from

the White House. They're all around there. Thank you all very much for

being here.

I would also like to thank the Vice President in his absence for the

work that he has done with me for 8 years to empower all Americans.

Looking back, I think this is my fourth trip, Mayor, to Flint. I'm

beginning to feel at home. I'm afraid if I come back, I'll get a tax

bill, I've been here so often. [Laughter] When I first came here in

1992, Mayor Stanley welcomed me. Now I'm about the leave the Presidency,

and when I'm gone, he'll still be mayor. [Laughter] I want to know what

the secret is. [Laughter]

Let me say, as Secretary Mineta said, this is a very fortunate time

for our country, and it happened because of a lot of people across

America working together. Flint has worked hard, against tough odds, to

bring this city back, to prepare for a new century. And you have made a

great deal of progress. I am quite sure that the people whom I visited

today who are involved with the Disability Network and the Career

Alliance and the people at this community college have played a major

role in the resurgence of this fine community.

But we all know that not everyone has shared in the American

economic renaissance. We all know there are people and places who have

been left behind, including millions of Americans with significant

disabilities who want to go to work but whose path is blocked and who

could work and could contribute, not only to their own lives but to the

rest of us, as well.

The great labor priest George Higgins articulated a fundamental

truth when he said, ``Work is an important way in which we exercise our

humanity. In return, society offers us not only our daily bread but a

sense that we, ourselves, are honored for the contributions we make.''

 

[[Page 2153]]

 

When I sought the Presidency in 1991 and 1992, my first objective

was to give work back to the American people. One of the strongest

supporters I had was your former Governor, who is here with me today,

and my friend of many years, Jim Blanchard, and I thank him for coming.

Not only here in communities in Michigan but in far away New Hampshire,

Jim went with me in the snows to listen to people who had lost their

livelihoods, who broke down over dinner, crying because they were afraid

they'd never be able to send their kids to school.

And we have, in large measure, succeeded. But we have not given

every American the chance, first, to get an education, and second, to

use their education to work and achieve the American dream. We have an

obligation to do it, an obligation that requires us to keep expanding

the circle of opportunity. And in this information age, when the pace of

change increasingly accelerates at a breathtaking rate, we cannot

achieve that goal if we leave any Americans stranded on the other side

of the now famous digital divide.

Now, for nearly 8 years now, the Vice President and I have worked to

break down barriers that hold people back. One of the most important

things we did was to fight hard in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 to

insist that people with disabilities have full access to telephone

equipment and service that most people take for granted. And one of our

Federal Communications Commissioners, Susan Ness, is here with me today.

I thank her, and I thank all of those who helped us to fight for the

rights of disabled Americans in the Telecommunications Act of 1996.

In 1998 we pushed through the Work Force Investment Act, requiring

that any information technology the Federal Government buys be

accessible to people with disabilities. And in 1999, I was very proud to

sign the Work Incentives Improvement Act, which will enable Americans

with disabilities to retain their Medicare or Medicaid coverage when

they go to work and provide more choices for job training. This will

give tens of thousands of Americans the opportunity to be in the work

force.

But breaking down barriers is not enough. People actually have to

have the tools they need to take advantage of this remarkable moment of

opportunity--especially the tools they need in cyberspace. There are

truly amazing new possibilities, as I saw today on my tour.

Through information technologies, a person with a disability, such

as the great physicist Stephen Hawking, can continue to be one of the

world's top astrophysicist and--and this is a big ``and,'' because he

suffers from Lou Gehrig's disease and is the longest living person, as

far as we know, in history with that disease--and I'm convinced that one

of the reasons he is alive today, with the fire in his eyes and the

passion burning in his heart, is that he can not only continue to learn;

he can continue to communicate what he knows and what he thinks to the

rest of the world, thanks to technology.

Millions of other people with disabilities can also access and use

the information superhighway if we build the necessary on ramps. For

example, we're creating a national network of community technology

centers so that all Americans, no matter where they live or what their

incomes, have easy and affordable access to the Internet.

I visited America's newest community technology center this

afternoon, right here in Flint, a partnership between the Department of

Education, Mott Community College, and the nonprofit Disability Network,

focusing on empowering people with disabilities to access the Internet

and learn computer skills. I was amazed by a lot of what I saw:

technology that translates web pages aloud for people who are blind or

visually impaired; provides captioning for deaf and hard-of-hearing

people; enables people with significant physical disabilities to control

a computer through eye movement and brain waves. This technology has

unbelievable potential.

I have a friend in North Carolina, named Joe Martin, with Lou

Gehrig's disease. Years ago, we worked together on education and the

economy in the South. Joe Martin then was in great health. He was

vigorous, energetic, charismatic, compelling, and effective. He's had

Lou Gehrig's disease for some time now, and in spite of how great he was

then, he is greater today in every way. Although he can't walk or talk

or use his hands, his

 

[[Page 2154]]

 

eyes provide a window on the world. With EyeGaze technology, he can look

at a computer screen and type away just using his eyes. He E-mails

people here in Flint. With another glance he can activate an electronic

voice that reads his words aloud. This astounding technology has enabled

him to keep his job as a banker, to talk with his wife and friends and,

now, write an about-to-be-published compelling book about his life.

Some of you may have heard of a young swimmer from South Africa,

named Terence Parkin. Yesterday he won the silver medal in the mens'

200-meter breast stroke, one of the best athletes in the world. He also

happens to be deaf, and he can't hear the starting buzzer that used to

begin all swimming races. Instead, he can now watch for a personal,

yellow starting light, which flashes at his starting block at the same

time the buzzer goes off. By installing the simplest of technology, a

little light bulb, officials gave this determined and gifted athlete his

shot at glory. He took it. Now he can celebrate the flash of sunlight

off his silver medal, and aren't you glad he got the chance to race?

These kinds of innovations are going to make a tremendous difference

in people's lives, especially as we incorporate them into mainstream

technology, something Judy emphasized. Here in Genesee County, employers

can't find enough people to fill all the technical jobs. Many pay $20 an

hour.

Now, if we want to keep the rest of the economy growing, we have to

make information technology more accessible. It's responsible for about

30 percent of the economic growth we've enjoyed over the last 8 years.

And we have to bring more people into the circle of opportunity to work

in information fields. That means people with disabilities have to be

able to enter the 21st century work force, not only for your own benefit

but for the rest of America as well.

Today I am honored to announce several major public and private

commitments that will move us in the right direction. First, 45 chief

executive officers of American high-tech companies have pledged to make

their products more accessible to people with disabilities, training

their employers to develop new accessible software, hardware, and

services.

Second, 25 of our Nation's leading research universities have

committed to helping us provide equal access to information, including

new course work for engineering majors and new tenure-track faculty

positions to address these challenges. That's a big deal. Think about

it: Major universities giving people tenure to teach how to provide

equal access to all Americans without regard to disabilities, to have

information-age technology. That's wonderful.

Third--I'm trying to keep up with all of this. Third, I am pleased

to announce that Flint's very own CS Mott Foundation--and I believe the

president of the Foundation, Bill White, is here--will support these

goals by funding a blue-ribbon task force, headed by the Disability

Network, to figure out how to make this new technology more affordable.

It's not enough to develop it if people can't afford it.

Fourth, I'm directing my Cabinet to explore ways of enhancing

Medicare and Medicaid to help people with disabilities pay for

technologies to enable them to live and work independently in their

communities. The Department of Education will provide grants totaling $4

million to the Web Accessibility Initiative and the National Center for

Accessible Media, to help to ensure that people with disabilities can

tap into the World Wide Web and make the most of on-line learning.

And finally, I am particularly proud to announce that AmeriCorps is

awarding $9 million in grants to put 1,200 volunteers into schools and

communities to teach students with disabilities and children from

difficult backgrounds the skills they need to take advantage of the

Internet.

One project in North Carolina will provide computer training to 300

students who are blind or visually impaired, showing them a whole new

horizon of possibilities. And I know, of course, that AmeriCorps

volunteers have been active in the disability community here in Flint,

and I thank them for their work. And thanks for wearing your T-shirt

today. You look good. Thank you.

I've got to get in a little plug for AmeriCorps now. Our legislation

reauthorizing AmeriCorps is now pending in the Congress. I have now

received a letter signed by 49 of the Nation's 50 Governors asking

 

[[Page 2155]]

 

Congress to reauthorize AmeriCorps and other community programs

administered by the Corporation for National Service, including the new

E-Corps program to bridge the digital divide. I hope Congress will take

a look at what you've done here and reauthorize AmeriCorps.

Let me just make two points in closing. Once more, bridging the

digital divide is not just the morally right thing to do; it is the

smart thing to do. I remember a decade ago when people were debating the

Americans with Disabilities Act, critics said it would be too expensive

to make public facilities available to put in curb cuts, handrails, to

put those signs in braille up. They were wrong. Since we've torn down

those barriers, more than a million Americans with disabilities have

entered the work force, and we have had the strongest economy America

has ever known. It is good to help people live their dreams.

And if we build new onramps to the information superhighway, people

with disabilities will help us build an even stronger America and, I

might add, share in the promise of the declaration of true independence.

The second thing I'd like to say is, this is about way more than

economics. It's important to be able to earn a living, and I want all of

you to contribute to America's economic welfare. But it's about more

than economics. A century ago, visionaries here in Flint harnessed the

potential of new technology to build the world's largest auto company.

Their success gave Americans a mobility and freedom that reshaped the

entire economic and physical landscape of our Nation.

Today, at the dawn of the information age, we have the potential to

give millions of Americans even greater freedom in cyberspace. As I

said, it's about more than economics. You know, when I was driving from

my last stop here, there were police along the way at intersections,

making sure that no children got in the way of the motorcade or no cars

went through the stop sign. One of those police officers was in a

wheelchair.

One of my speechwriters has one disabled arm and one prostheses. He

writes a heck of a speech. It's nice that he's got a job, but it's more

important that the feelings of his heart can be expressed. One of the

things I've learned in nearly 30 years in public life and a few years

before that, just sort of ambling around the world, is that everybody's

got a story; everybody's got dreams; everybody's afraid sometimes and

brave sometimes. And in the end, when you strip it all away, there's not

a great deal of difference in the relative significance of our stories.

If you put all the people in the world end to end, with the person with

the lowest IQ on one end and the highest IQ on the other, you couldn't

stick a straw between any two people.

The whole premise of America is that we are inherently, in a

fundamental way, equal, though unique. People carry different burdens in

life, and everybody, even the most blessed, carry a few. God puts bigger

burdens on some than others, but everybody should have the chance to

have their story. In the end, in the not completely knowable terrain of

the human heart is the real argument for all these efforts.

So I ask you, I'll do everything I can in the time remaining. For

the rest of my life I'll be grateful that I happened to be President at

this moment of true revolution in human ability. But we have to keep

working and never forget the economics is important, but the dreams

matter more.

Thank you, and God bless you.

 

Note: The President spoke at 3:15 p.m. in the Ballinger Field House. In

his remarks, he referred to Karla Hudson, rehabilitation counselor,

Michigan Commission for the Blind, who introduced the President; Mayor

Woodrow Stanley of Flint; Judy Brewer, director, Web Accessibility

Initiative; Pamela Loving, president and chief executive officer, Career

Alliance; Michael Zelley, executive director, Disability Network; and

Richard Shaink, president, Mott Community College.

 

 

 



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