[Nfbmo] Judge finds blind people owed 30 million

[David Andrews]

Can I be a "back dated" honorary Missourian?

Dave

At 04:26 PM 4/2/2010, you wrote:
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>Posted: Friday, 02 April 2010 12:12PM
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>Judge awards $30 million to blind Missourians
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>KMOXNews at kmox.com
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>ST. LOUIS (AP)  -- Missouri owes $30 million to 3,300 blind 
>residents to make up for years of shortchanging payments to them 
>through the Blind Pension Fund,
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>a judge has ruled.
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>Cole County Judge Patricia Joyce determined the Missouri Department 
>of Social Services miscalculated benefits dating to 1992. She 
>awarded nearly $19 million
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>in unpaid benefits and more than $11 million in interest.
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>It wasn't clear Friday whether the state would appeal Thursday's 
>decision. A Social Services spokesman referred questions to the 
>Missouri Attorney General's
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>office. A spokeswoman for the attorney general did not return 
>messages seeking comment.
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>Pensioners were underpaid for more than a decade, said attorney 
>Deborah Greider, who filed the class action lawsuit on behalf of the 
>St. Louis-based Missouri
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>Council of the Blind and seven blind Missourians. After the lawsuit 
>was filed about five years ago, Missouri recalculated the pension 
>and now pays a fair
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>amount, she said.
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>The average blind pensioner now receives about $651 a month from the 
>state, and for many, that is their only income.
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>"Most of these people are poor and unemployed, many are elderly," 
>Greider said. She recalled testimony from one blind woman who was 
>asked what an additional
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>$40 a month would mean to her.
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>"She said, 'I could feed my guide dog better, I could get a pizza 
>once in a while,'" Greider said. "It was really heartbreaking."
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>Denny Huff, president of the Missouri Council of the Blind, said the 
>state shorted people who were already on tight budgets.
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>"To be denied even a percentage of what they should have been 
>receiving may not seem like much to some people," he said, "but for 
>a lot of recipients, it
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>affected them a great deal."
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>The Missouri Constitution has required the General Assembly since 
>1875 to levy an annual property tax to fund the Blind Pension Fund. 
>But starting in 1992,
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>the state began using some of the money for other expenses, Greider said.
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>For example, some of the money goes to rehabilitation services for 
>the blind. But Greider said the pensions should be fully funded 
>first, with leftover
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>money going for rehab services.