[nfbmi-talk] goes to mi state library all rooms

joe harcz Comcast joeharcz at comcast.net
Sun Oct 27 13:04:40 UTC 2013


RESOLUTION 2011-01
RESOLUTION RELATED TO PROGRAM ACCESS AND MCB
 

WHEREAS, all Vocational Rehabilitation entities, including the Michigan Commission for the Blind, (MCB) have long ago been required to provide “program access” to all the facilities it uses on a daily basis and to hold hearings, meetings and events in fully accessible facilities, even to the point of signing assurances with the Rehabilitation Services Administration annually that it does fully comply with these long-standing obligations; and

 

            WHEREAS, one of those long-standing requirements was, and is to have raised character Braille signage mounted on every permanent room, nearest the latch side of each door in accordance with American with Disabilities Act Guidelines (3.40.1, 4, 5, and 6); and

 

            WHEREAS, all such barriers were to have been removed under the required ADA transition plan by no later than July 26, 1995, yet exist to this very day in most, if not all, facilities used by the MCB; and

 

            WHEREAS, Patrick D. Cannon was the former Chair of the United States Access Board which establishes the standards of the ADAAG, the State of Michigan ADA Coordinator responsible for implementation and the Director of MCB responsible for full compliance and knowingly so; and

 

            WHEREAS, the ADA and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act are civil rights laws requiring affirmative action; and therefore these inactions by Cannon constitute not only gross dereliction of known duties and deliberate indifference to these civil rights laws, but also must be considered malicious and intentional acts of mass discrimination; and

 

            WHEREAS, members of, and indeed the entire state affiliate of the National Federation of the Blind of Michigan, have promoted the full application of these requirements repeatedly over the years along with documenting violations; and

 

            WHEREAS, the NFB-MI has long promoted Braille, including its use in the built environment, for reasons obvious to all:

 

            NOW THEREFORE, be it resolved by the National Federation of the Blind of Michigan in convention assembled this 6th day of November, 2011 in the City of Kalamazoo, Michigan that forthwith the NFB-MI lodges a formal Complaint with the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) in the United States Department of Education, along with supporting documentation, on behalf of all its members, and indeed all people who are blind in the State of Michigan, against Patrick D. Cannon, individually, and against the Michigan Commission for the Blind as an entity; and

 

            BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that as a part of this Complaint, the NFB-MI urges OCR to promptly enforce our individual and collective civil rights and to make the class whole as its charge.

 



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