[Nfbmo] Greetings

[Gary Wunder]

Dear Kristin:

 

This is fantastic news. Thank you so much for sending it, and I will share
it immediately.

 

 

 

From: Gentry, Kristin D [mailto:Kristin.D.Gentry at dss.mo.gov] 
Sent: Thursday, August 20, 2015 11:52 AM
To: Chris Gray; Eugene Coulter; St. Julien, Michael A; Gary Wunder
(gwunder at earthlink.net)
Cc: Bennett-Williams, Kelsey; Branstetter, Katherine A
Subject: Greetings

 

I know it has been a while since we were all last together and since we
first began the process of creating an office to specialize for our visually
impaired customers.  We have been working diligently on cases this past year
throughout the process.  You may have heard from customers as we have been
reaching out to many trying to update cases as well as trying to correct
inaccuracies that we have found.  In the process of trying to get visual
reviews updated we have inadvertently created a bit of a backlog for visual
field exams for some applicants in a few of our larger areas.  We have also
tried to not send anyone for a visual exam if we can find a way around it
and we have waived over 300 cases so far.  Most without a visual exam.  

 

We are very excited to see a lot of positive results and we welcome you to
send us issues your customers are having so that we may resolve them based
on policy and the expert knowledge we are creating with this unit.  We have
certainly learned a lot along the way and continue to learn.  We have put
our application, eligibility review and our visual review packet in large
print through the Braille and Narration Center so that we have them for any
customer who would prefer large print.  These will be posted on our website
in the future as well.  Since our meeting they have printed "Time Sensitive"
on the eligibility review packets and send those out on yellow paper.  They
are working on robo calls and from what I hear; some of these calls have
begun to take place.  

 

Our unit is expected to be stood up September 1, 2015 although we have been
working cases since December 2014.  We didn't have all the cases under our
office so we have been working them off lists and through contacts from you
as well as our fellow workers.  The bulk of our cases should be showing up
by the end of this month though so we will have even better knowledge of who
are customers are and how we can help them.  

 

We have made a few changes recently and I do want to share those with you.
We moved our processing center to Troy, MO although the staff that work on
the cases has not changed.  We have just added more staff to work them out
of the Warrenton, Troy and Bowling Green offices.  We receive all of our
mail in the Troy office now at PO Box 158, Troy, MO 63379.  Please feel free
to share this information with your customers if they need to get mail to
us.  The fax number is 636-528-3861.  We will be utilizing a toll free
number which routes to our Warrenton office.  That number is 1-866-877-8155
and can be shared with customers who need to reach us directly instead of
trying to call their local office or the Call Center.  

 

We hope that we are continuing to make progress and we welcome your
suggestions or input.  

 

Kristin Gentry

Lincoln, Pike & Warren County Manager

636-528-2133 (232)/ 573-324-2243/ 636-456-3307

Montgomery City Resource Center

Owensville Resource Center