[NFBNJ] [Brl-monitor] The Braille Monitor, January 2020
joe ruffalo
nfbnj1 at verizon.net
Tue Dec 31 19:57:04 UTC 2019
Greetings to all!
Hot off the press, Braille Monitor for January 2020.
Take special notice with information pertaining to the national convention
in Houston, Texas from July 14 through July 19.
In addition, recipes are from several contributors from the NFBNJ.
Warmly,
Joe
**
BRAILLE MONITOR
Vol. 63, No. 1 January 2020
Gary Wunder, Editor
Distributed by email, in inkprint, in Braille, and on USB flash
drive, by the
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND
Mark Riccobono, President
telephone: 410-659-9314
email address: nfb at nfb.org
website address: http://www.nfb.org
NFBnet.org: http://www.nfbnet.org
NFB-NEWSLINE� information: 866-504-7300
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Letters to the President, address changes, subscription requests, and
orders for NFB literature should be sent to the national office. Articles
for the Monitor and letters to the editor may also be sent to the national
office or may be emailed to gwunder at nfb.org.
Monitor subscriptions cost the Federation about forty dollars per year.
Members are invited, and nonmembers are requested, to cover the
subscription cost. Donations should be made payable to National Federation
of the Blind and sent to:
National Federation of the Blind
200 East Wells Street at Jernigan Place
Baltimore, Maryland 21230-4998
THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND KNOWS THAT BLINDNESS IS NOT THE
CHARACTERISTIC THAT DEFINES YOU OR YOUR FUTURE. EVERY DAY WE RAISE THE
EXPECTATIONS OF BLIND PEOPLE, BECAUSE LOW EXPECTATIONS CREATE OBSTACLES
BETWEEN BLIND PEOPLE AND OUR DREAMS. YOU CAN LIVE THE LIFE YOU WANT;
BLINDNESS IS NOT WHAT HOLDS YOU BACK. THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND
IS NOT AN ORGANIZATION SPEAKING FOR THE BLIND-IT IS THE BLIND SPEAKING FOR
OURSELVES.
ISSN 0006-8829
� 2020 by the National Federation of the Blind
Each issue is recorded on a thumb drive (also called a memory stick
or USB flash drive). You can read this audio edition using a computer or a
National Library Service digital player. The NLS machine has two slots-the
familiar book-cartridge slot just above the retractable carrying handle and
a second slot located on the right side near the headphone jack. This
smaller slot is used to play thumb drives. Remove the protective rubber pad
covering this slot and insert the thumb drive. It will insert only in one
position. If you encounter resistance, flip the drive over and try again.
(Note: If the cartridge slot is not empty when you insert the thumb drive,
the digital player will ignore the thumb drive.) Once the thumb drive is
inserted, the player buttons will function as usual for reading digital
materials. If you remove the thumb drive to use the player for cartridges,
when you insert it again, reading should resume at the point you stopped.
You can transfer the recording of each issue from the thumb drive to
your computer or preserve it on the thumb drive. However, because thumb
drives can be used hundreds of times, we would appreciate their return in
order to stretch our funding. Please use the return envelope enclosed with
the drive when you return the device.
Houston Site of 2020 NFB Convention
The 2020 convention of the National Federation of the Blind will take
place in Houston, Texas, July 14 to July 19, at the Hilton Americas-Houston
hotel, 1600 Lamar Street, Houston, TX 77010. Make your room reservation as
soon as possible with the Hilton Americas-Houston. Call 1-800-236-2905 to
reserve your room in the main hotel. If you wish to stay in our overflow
hotel, the Marriott Marquis Houston, the number to call is 1-877-688-4323.
The 2020 room rate at our main hotel is $105 per night and applies to
singles and doubles as well as triples and quads. Hotel and sales taxes in
Houston are 13.38 percent and 8.25 percent, respectively. The rate for the
overflow Marriott Marquis is slightly higher at $119. As with our main
hotel, hotel and sales taxes are additional, and the nightly rate covers up
to four in a room. Both hotels will take a deposit of the first night's
room rate for each room and will require a credit card or a personal check.
If you use a credit card, the deposit will be charged against your card
immediately. If a reservation is cancelled before Friday, June 1, 2020,
half of the deposit will be returned. Otherwise refunds will not be made.
Rooms will be available on a first-come, first-served basis.
Reservations may be made before June 1, 2020, assuming that rooms are still
available. After that time the hotels will not hold our room block for the
convention. In other words, you should get your reservation in soon.
Both hotels offer complimentary in-room wireless internet (though the
Marriott requires a free-to-establish Marriott Bonvoy account) and fitness
center access for all guests. All rooms are furnished with mini
refrigerators along with many of the usual amenities such as in-room safes,
irons and ironing boards, and hair dryers. After the day's events, you can
get your swim on at either hotel. The Hilton has an indoor pool on the 23rd
floor, while the Marriott features an outdoor pool adjacent to its Texas-
shaped lazy river pool. Both hotels have several on-premise dining outlets
with a broad range of additional options within a short walk from the front
door.
The schedule for the 2020 convention is:
Tuesday, July 14 Seminar Day
Wednesday, July 15 Registration and Resolutions Day
Thursday, July 16 Board Meeting and Division Day
Friday, July 17 Opening Session
Saturday, July 18 Business Session
Sunday, July 19 Banquet Day and Adjournment
Vol. 63, No. 1 January
2020
Contents
Illustration: New Federation Presidential Portrait Unveiled
Time for Action for Blind Students
by Kathryn Webster
Screening Out Blind Applicants because Software is Deemed Inaccessible
by Valerie Yingling
Creating a Beautiful Space Where Work is Done
A Mountain, a Waterfall, a Cracked Pool, and a Christmas Tree Color Wheel
by Ray McGeorge
Vote by Mail Ballot Now Accessible to Blind Coloradans
by Curtis Chong
Voting Letter to Secretaries of State
by Lou Ann Blake
Anger or Righteous Indignation
by Maurice Peret
Submissions Open for San Francisco LightHouse's Holman Prize
by Christina Daniels
Trying to Get Honest with the Hope of Becoming Involved
by Katrina Wright
Recipes
Monitor Miniatures
[PHOTO CAPTION: A Federation flag hangs to hide the new portrait before its
unveiling]
[PHOTO CAPTION: The crowd gathered for the unveiling of the portrait]
[PHOTO CAPTION: Barbara Loos prepares to unveil the portrait]
[PHOTO CAPTION: The new portrait of President Riccobono unveiled]
New Federation Presidential Portrait Unveiled
On the fourth floor of the Jernigan Institute hang three portraits of
the National Federation of the Blind's longest serving presidents and most
influential leaders-Jacobus tenBroek, Kenneth Jernigan, and Marc Maurer.
You can find these portraits at the left end of hall leading east from the
atrium to the lunchroom. On the opposite wall from these three framed
portraits now hangs a portrait of our current (and fourth longest serving)
president, Mark Riccobono. Rendered in oil on canvas, the portrait captures
a smiling President Riccobono from chest up in his office at the Jernigan
Institute. He is wearing a dark suit coat with a white shirt and crimson
necktie. In the background is a view of the outdoors through the
presidential office windows. Visible amidst the foliage across Wells Street
is a couple of the 101 Wells converted apartment buildings with the
Patapsco River in the background. Above the horizon is a soft blue sky with
light scattered clouds. The twenty-inch-by-twenty-six-inch portrait hangs
in a muted gold frame.
Artist Gavin Glakas has painted governors, senators, and congressmen
with works hanging in such places as the United States Capitol and
Georgetown University. Mr. Glakas spent time chatting with and
photographing President Riccobono before beginning his work on the
portrait.
[PHOTO CAPTION: Kathryn Webster]
Time for Action for Blind Students
by Kathryn Webster
From the Editor: Kathryn Webster is the latest in a long line of
young men and women who have been chosen by students to head the
Federation's student division, the National Association of Blind Students
(NABS). Kathryn is intelligent, motivated, poised, friendly, and welcoming.
She is everything we could want in a Federation leader, and here is her
most recent contribution to our magazine:
On Friday, December 6, 2019, blind students across the United States
of America marveled at the great news of the introduction of the Accessible
Instructional Materials in Higher Education Act (HR 5312.) To parents, this
will encourage their blind children to shoot for the stars because they
would be welcomed with open arms in higher education. To educators, this
would provide mentorship and support because, let's face it, we all don't
have the answers but want to accommodate our students. To leaders in the
disability community, this would be paramount because the push for
accessible and inclusive education is top of mind, as it very well should
be. Most significantly, for blind students this monumental piece of
legislation would level the playing field so we have equivalent
opportunities to our sighted counterparts in the classroom and beyond.
As president of one of the most proud, determined, and mighty
divisions of the National Federation of the Blind-the National Association
of Blind Students-I applaud Congressman Phil Roe (R-TN) and Congressman Joe
Courtney (D-CT) for harnessing the value of this legislation and
introducing it to the House of Representatives in hopes of driving it to
majority support, and ultimately, implementation for the benefit of our
students. We are eager to push efforts forward to ensure all students, who
are blind or otherwise print-disabled, have full and equal access to
university course materials such as textbooks, research equipment, and
online learning platforms.
I'd like to share one small example in an attempt to illustrate
moments where accessibility would have furthered one's reach in attaining
aspirations. In my pursuit to attain a bachelor of science in Data
Analytics and Statistics, I struggled to comprehend concepts covered in a
high-level statistics course during my time at Wake Forest University
because of the lack of accessible materials. The inability to grasp visual
topics had nothing to do with my mind and brainpower; instead, it had
everything to do with inaccessible textbooks and graphical measuring tools.
Blind students are forced to push courses to the following semesters;
encouraged to take other, more text-heavy classes; asked to do less than
our peers, simply because accessibility is not advertised as a possibility
when it truly is an option, and a needed one. This bill would limit those
barriers, while making sure colleges and universities had somewhere to turn
in exploring solutions to create inclusion in the classroom.
The National Association of Blind Students leadership and membership
vehemently applauds the introduction of this bill, and we will put forth
all efforts to educate, spread awareness, and broaden understanding of our
capabilities as contributing and active members of society.
It is our time to take action! I am leaning on our communities to
push this bill forward.
1. If you are a blind student: write a paragraph about your experience
in the classroom, whether an access barrier or one of those rare
and fortunate encounters with positive accessibility, and share
your remarks with board member Trisha Kulkarni by emailing
trishak.nfb at gmail.com.
2. If you are an educator, parent, or ally: contact President Kathryn
Webster at nabs.president at gmail.com to learn more about how you can
support this effort.
3. If you are a congressman: we need your voice to ensure our students
receive equal and adequate education, allowing them to shine and
contribute as we all eagerly desire to do.
We are beyond excited to witness an initiative that could change the
landscape for blind students for years to come, and we deeply appreciate
any support and assistance in making this possible.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Ronit Mazzoni and her kids, Alex and Elena]
Screening out Blind Applicants because Software is Deemed Inaccessible
by Valerie Yingling
From the Editor: Valerie Yingling works for us as our legal program
coordinator. She has good name recognition within the National Federation
of the Blind because reports given at state conventions strongly encourage
contacting her about legal matters in which we are involved or those in
which a member believes we should be. Here is what Valerie writes about a
most troubling trend that is emerging as an impediment to blind people
finding employment:
Last summer, with support from the National Federation of the Blind,
Ronit Mazzoni filed a disability discrimination suit against her
prospective employer Myriad Genetics. In her lawsuit, Ronit asserted that
Myriad refused to hire her because she is blind and requires the use of
screen access software. Myriad had determined that its proprietary software
was inaccessible with JAWS screen reading software and based its decision
to not hire Ronit on this factor alone.
Too often, the National Federation of the Blind receives reports from
members regarding employers who make job offers contingent on whether their
software is compatible with JAWS or other screen access software. As in
Ronit's experience, blind applicants must often unfairly wait for a job
offer or assigned start date while the employer purports to evaluate its
software for accessibility.
Employers that require applicants with disabilities to be able to use
designated workplace software without any accommodations do so in violation
of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and many other laws. The ADA
prohibits employers from denying employment opportunities to individuals
with disabilities when the denial is based on the need to provide
reasonable accommodations.[1] The ADA similarly prohibits employers from
applying selection criteria that screens out individuals with disabilities
unless such criteria are job-related.[2] As Ronit's complaint notes, though
"software may be job-related, the inaccessibility of such software
certainly is not job-related, nor can it be consistent with business
necessity."[3]
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software and other prevalent
workplace software can be built to be accessible. In situations where it is
not accessible, the software can almost always be scripted so that it is
compatible with JAWS or other screen access software. The US Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) provides guidance regarding the
interactive dialogue that should occur between an employer and job
applicant when accommodations are needed. Ronit knew all of this when she
applied for the TeleGenetics counselor position with Myriad Genetics in May
2017.
As a TeleGenetics counselor, Ronit would provide remote genetic
counseling services for clients. Ronit was excited about the position with
Myriad because it would offer her the opportunity to work from home and
allow her to spend more time with her husband and young children. Ronit is
a qualified and experienced genetics counselor, having obtained her master
of science in Genetic Counseling and having already worked for nine years
in the field.
Ronit had previously encountered accessibility barriers in her field
and was undeterred. When she was first expected to draw a pedigree, a
visual representation of her patients' family medical history, she asked
her husband, a software developer, to write a program that she could use
instead of the traditional paper version. In her current job, when she
encounters a patient's hand-written family health history, she asks a
reader to provide her with the inaccessible information. Ronit has long
believed that the most difficult part of being a blind genetics counselor
is not performing the job itself, instead it is convincing others that she
is capable.[4]
Ronit approached her interview with Myriad confidently. She disclosed
her blindness and participated in subsequent videoconference with the
interviewers to discuss accommodations and demonstrate how she uses JAWS.
Myriad expressed concerns about Ronit's ability to perform the TeleGenetics
counselor position, given her need for screen access software. Ronit said
she was willing to be flexible about her work methods, but Myriad said it
would not be as flexible.
Though Myriad's hiring staff repeatedly told Ronit that she was
qualified for the position and would be great at the job she sought, Myriad
was resolute that it would not hire her without first ensuring that there
would be no technology barriers that could affect her work. Ronit
encouraged Myriad to engage an accessibility expert to evaluate the
software's interoperability, and Myriad did, though the individual was not
familiar with Java software and in the end was unable to determine whether
anything could be done to resolve the access barriers.
Ronit persisted and offered to pay for a consultant who was qualified
to evaluate Myriad's software with JAWS. Myriad agreed, and this consultant
determined that with the correct configurations, the CRM software was
generally accessible with JAWS. Only a few features would require
remediation. Myriad, however, decided that it was unwilling to remediate
its CRM software and unwilling to provide JAWS scripting or other
accommodations, even though Myriad's software was designed and built in-
house, and Myriad has on staff a robust IT team that makes regular updates
to the software. Myriad's hiring manager told Ronit that Myriad would have
loved to hire her but was unwilling to change policies and procedures to
accommodate her. But for her blindness, Myriad would have hired Ronit.
Ronit's case is ongoing. She and her attorney, Tim Elder, continue to
fight, knowing that a successful resolution could help to improve
employment opportunities for other members of the National Federation of
the Blind. With this lawsuit, Ronit is hoping to effect systemic change.
Among other things, she has asked the court to rule that Myriad:
. Must make its software accessible to the blind
. Must implement policies, practices, and programs that provide equal
access for qualified individuals with disabilities
. Must pay Ronit back pay, including wages, salary, and employment
benefits, and must pay Ronit damages for emotional pain, suffering,
inconvenience, loss of enjoyment of life, and humiliation, and
. Must reimburse all of Ronit's attorney's fees
Ronit is not alone in her experience. If you, like Ronit, encounter
an employer who makes a job offer contingent upon whether your screen
access software is compatible with the employer's software, please consider
taking the following actions:
. Alert the NFB-contact Valerie Yingling, legal program coordinator, at
vyingling at nfb.org or 410-659-9314, extension 2440, so that we can
monitor your matter.
. Familiarize yourself with your rights under Title 1 of the ADA and
Section 501 of the Rehabilitation Act.
. Recommend that the employer engage an accessibility expert to assess
how the company's software can work with screen access software.
. Prepare a timeline of events and gather together documentation that
evidences the discrimination.
. Determine whether you want to file a complaint and if so, with which
entity-the EEOC or a state or local agency. File within your
designated statute of limitations. You do not need to have an attorney
to file a charge of employment discrimination.
For more information about Ronit's lawsuit or your rights as a job
applicant with disabilities, please contact Valerie Yingling, legal program
coordinator, at vyingling at nfb.org or 410-659-9314, extension 2440.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: The foyer, including the fireplace seating area, and the
Diane and Ray McGeorge Living Room.]
[PHOTO CAPTION: John Fritz touching The Kindling Point Sustained. ]
[PHOTO CAPTION: President Mark Riccobono lights the fireplace]
[PHOTO CAPTION: The NFB logo mosaic]
[PHOTO CAPTION: The McGeorge Living Room]
[PHOTO CAPTION: The Maryland sandstone fountain]
[PHOTO CAPTION: The family room and kitchen]
[PHOTO CAPTION: Terri Rupp checks out the Braille messages wall.]
[PHOTO CAPTION: The fitness room]
The hang out
Creating a Beautiful Space Where Beautiful Work is Done
From the Editor: Recently we have made major improvements to what was
formerly known as the east mall, the west mall, black cabinet hall, and the
dining room. These improvements were made by the owner of the city block
complex owned by the Jacobus tenBroek Memorial Fund and which houses the
National Federation of the Blind Jernigan Institute. The Grand Opening of
this splendid edition was held on Thursday evening, December 5, 2019. It
was attended by the National Federation of the Blind Board of Directors and
the Jacobus tenBroek Memorial Fund Board of Directors. Here is a
description of our newly renovated space and the way it is now being used:
National Federation of the Blind Jernigan Institute
Barney Street Wing Remodel 2019
Overview
In 1981 sleeping rooms were first built into the National Center for
the Blind (now the NFB Jernigan Institute) complex. Those rooms allowed for
seminars and training events to be held at the building in a cost-effective
manner. Over the years, the scope of our training programs has expanded,
expectations for space have changed, and increasingly more attention has
been paid to making our physical space match our brand values. As a result,
the National Federation of the Blind collaborated with the Jacobus tenBroek
Memorial Fund to envision the future of the National Federation of the
Blind Jernigan Institute property. Phase one of the tenBroek Fund's work
was to perform a full examination of the use of the space at the property
and then streamline the use and reduce unwanted clutter. The second phase
was to develop a new visitor space intended to enhance the event experience
of the dining room at the northwest corner of the building and provide
sleeping and casual spaces that bring a sense of home within the property.
This remodeling project-costing more than $4 million-is the most extensive
project undertaken since the new construction on the southwest corner of
the property (ground broke for that project in October 2001). As a result
of the continued leadership of the Jacobus tenBroek Memorial Fund Board of
Directors and their commitment to use every dollar wisely, this project has
been conducted without any debt financing, as was the work in 2001. With
strong fiscal management and support from partner organizations like the
National Federation of the Blind and the American Action Fund for Blind
Children and Adults (two of the primary tenants of the building),
investments in the property in South Baltimore continue to ensure that this
one-of-a-kind property serves as a base for advancing the full
participation of the blind in society on terms of equality. This remodeled
space, like other parts of the building, has been built to last to serve
our needs into the future, to be the pride of blind people who share
ownership in the property, and to welcome our sighted visitors who
experience it.
Space Overview
You can think of the Barney Street wing of the fourth floor as having four
sections:
. Dining room
. Foyer and living room
. Casual space, including the fitness room
. Sleeping rooms
The wing is named after Barney Street, which borders the property on
the north side. From west (Byrd Street) to east (Johnson Street) the entire
wing of the original building (circa early 1900s) is 21,000 square feet.
Farthest to the west is an outdoor deck that was added in the early 2000s
when the new building was built. (The wing is 23,600 square feet with the
deck.) To the east of the deck is the dining room, which measures forty-
nine by fifty-seven feet. Immediately south of the dining room is the
kitchen. Immediately to the east of the dining room is the living room and
foyer space. At the north end of this space overlooking Barney Street is
the Diane and Ray McGeorge Living Room. South of the living room but
contiguous to it is the foyer. The casual spaces are accessed through a set
of glass doors in the east side of the foyer. Wrapping around the north and
far east sides of the casual spaces are the twenty-one bedrooms. These
rooms overlook either Barney Street (to the north) or Johnson Street (to
the east).
Dining Room
Upgrades to the dining room are intended to improve the functionality
of the space and to create a more open atmosphere. Most notably the doors
have been removed and two entrances now lead into the dining room through
its east wall. The entrance to the south-accessible from the foyer-is the
entrance that previous visitors will be familiar with using. Another
entrance at the north end of the east wall leads from the living room into
the dining room. The serving line that has been at the south side of the
dining room has been moved north about four feet and refaced. The counter
now extends all the way to the east wall of the room. A wall that used to
be the west end of the serving line has been removed along with the
refrigerator that was there. This reduces the noise in the room and makes
the serving area longer. Behind the serving counter, large cabinets have
been installed. Along the west wall of the dining room running from the
south to the middle of the room, where double doors lead to the outdoor
deck, a new drink station has been installed. Between the two entrances on
the east wall, there are two new bus stations for dishes and garbage. There
is a recycling container between the two bus stations. The new additions to
the room are faced with a glossy white finish to add contrast to the space
and to connect it with the adjacent spaces in the wing. A new HVAC system
and ceiling round out the changes to the dining room. The piano, which used
to be in the northwest corner, has been moved to the living room, opening
up some space for functions in the dining room.
Foyer
The foyer is the first space that most visitors will encounter when
coming into this wing of the building. The double doors that lead to the
foyer are accessible from the north end of the Jernigan Institute building.
These doors are at the end of a hallway that runs from the approximate
center of Members Hall north to the Barney Street wing. Stepping through
the doors into the foyer, you are looking north. You are greeted with a
transition from the carpet of the meeting and office space to a luxury
vinyl tile that runs through the remodeled spaces. Immediately to your
right is a utility closet. The foyer is open and bright and has thirteen-
foot ceilings. The space features white painted walls, light oak-colored
floors, and natural light that comes from three brand new windows in the
living room at the far north end. No walls separate the foyer from the
living room. The space does include three of the building's original
columns that have been painted to match each space. The columns run in a
line from south to north and are eighteen feet east of the west wall of the
space. Visually your attention is drawn to a forty-eight-inch diameter
fireplace that sits on a seven-foot square base that is approximately
twenty-five feet north and a few feet east of the doors to enter the foyer.
Stepping a few feet into the space and taking a right turn around the
corner of the utility closet, you now have a long wall to your right
(south). There is a steel beam running about twelve feet to the north along
the ceiling. This beam was used in the building when it was a light
manufacturing facility. A piece of the beam used to stick out into the
courtyard, but that external piece was removed in 2002 to make room for the
new building. This piece of the beam had been hidden in the ceiling, and we
chose to leave it exposed (although with new paint) as a symbol of the
history of the building. If it looks like it does not serve any purpose in
this space, well, it doesn't. It is just a symbol of where the building has
been.
In front of you (to the east about fifteen feet) are two glass doors
that will take you east into the casual space. The keycard reader is on the
wall to the right of the doors about four feet back from the door. If you
went about half of the way east to the glass doors and turned left (to the
north), you would find two single restrooms immediately in front of you.
These are the closest restrooms to the dining room. Now, let's go back to
when you turned the corner of the utility closet and had the wall on your
right side. Turn to face the wall on your right (south).
The Kindling Point Sustained
This wall includes a large piece of art measuring eight feet by nine
feet. Touch it; that is why it is there. This art celebrates the patterns
of thought that have been cultivated within the organized blind movement.
The art also pays tribute to the Federation's longest-serving President,
Dr. Marc Maurer, by incorporating lines of his 1991 banquet address,
Reflecting the Flame. The art also honors the stability of the National
Federation of the Blind Jernigan Institute property while acknowledging
that the goal is to influence the surrounding community, state, nation, and
world by sharing our pattern of thought. Marc Maurer's leadership in
expanding our property and the reach of our organization are symbolized in
this art that includes readable Braille. The appearance of the piece gives
the impression of logs in a fire. The way we sustain our organization is by
constantly building leaders, and we hope this art and the space around it
inspires the development of a new core of long-time leaders of our
movement.
Here is how the artist commissioned to create this piece, Kenn
Kotara, described The Kindling Point Sustained:
The large piece is made up of five separate panels that hang
together as one. Each of the wooden-framed panels are covered with
thin sheets of clear-coated copper. The horizontal panel at the bottom
suggests a log while the four irregularly-shaped vertical pieces
invoke the impression of flames. A map of Baltimore is the background
of the entire piece. Each street on the map is made up of a line of
Braille from Marc Maurer's speech, Reflecting the Flame. Verdigris
surfaces may interfere with the readability in certain areas due to
build-up of patina, a tactile experience that will change over time as
more fingertips read the Braille. The location of the NFB offices and
the title of the speech are in the lower right of the piece.
The Fireplace
While facing the art on the south wall, if you turn back to the north
and walk forward, you will find carpet. When you reach the south edge of
the carpet, if you were to follow the carpet east, you would find the
corner of a wall that borders the east side of the foyer and runs north to
serve as the eastern border for the living room. If you followed the corner
of that wall to the east, you would be back at the entrances to the
restrooms. If you were to follow the south edge of the carpet to the west,
you would find one of the columns (this is the southernmost exposed column
in this space). This column creates a natural corner for the west end of
the carpet. This carpeted area includes seating for relaxing and
socializing. At the north end of this carpeted space is the wood-burning
fireplace. The fireplace sits on a seven-foot square platform that has
Pennsylvania bluestone in it. This bluestone was taken out of the house
that Dr. Jernigan owned in West Baltimore for many decades. The stone was
removed during a remodeling project at the house and has been waiting
patiently for a place where a touch of Dr. Jernigan was needed. As the
leading civil rights leader of the blind of the twentieth century, Kenneth
Jernigan gave us strength and a foundation to build upon. When you sit on
this base and feel the stone, think of the teaching that Dr. Jernigan gave
to us. He recognized that civil rights movements were not adequately
sustained because they did not cultivate the next generation of leaders. He
taught us to plan for the future and to provide a base for our next leaders
to stand upon. Dr. Jacobus tenBroek's fireplace tools are located nearby,
providing the opportunity to "tend the fire" to pass on to the newer
Federation leaders.
The fireplace in the center of this base is our active contribution
to reflecting the flame together. The fireplace is comprised of a metal
pendant that hangs from the ceiling and a glass enclosure that sits
immediately on top of the base. Here fires can be burned, while
Federationists sit on all sides sharing stories and building relationships.
NFB Logo Art
On the wall to the east of the carpet in the foyer is a mosaic of the
National Federation of the Blind logo including our symbol, our name, and
our tagline. This mosaic was made by Mary Degnan, an artist who happens to
be deafblind. Here is a full description of the mosaic:
A three-foot square mosaic features our orange, green, and blue
logo, accented with white glass rods used for the canes. The symbol is
set against a black stained-glass background that acts as a shimmering
lake of color as the light reflects the iridescence of the dark glass.
The name of the organization is three feet by four feet and has the
same iridescent, black stained-glass background while the letters are
done in a matte soft white for optimum contrast and visibility. The
italicized tagline "Live the Life You Want" is done in mirror shards.
The Living Room
The Diane and Ray McGeorge Living Room is named for the dynamic
couple that established and grew the Colorado Center for the Blind. Through
the personal commitment of these two loving mentors and tough advocates,
the lives of thousands of blind people have been influenced. The living
room is north of the foyer. There is not a clear transition between the two
spaces. However, the furniture cluster in the living room sits on a
separate square of carpet from the fireplace carpet, and this area is
intended to feel a little more like home than the grand openness of the
foyer. The walls, millwork, and nine-foot-six-inch ceiling are black in
color, known as Cyberspace, to suggest a more intimate environment. The
north wall of the living room has three brand new windows-as the original
window openings had been boarded up since we secured the property in 1978.
In the northeast corner of the space is the piano that was previously
located in the dining room. On the west wall, between the two openings to
the dining room, is a large countertop with a tiled wall behind it. On the
east wall is shelving for Braille books and other artifacts of the
organized blind movement. On the east wall between the mosaic in the foyer
and the shelving in the living room is an emergency exit door (leading to
the casual space).
Fountain
In the middle of the living room shelving is a fountain creating the
sound of gently running water. This fountain symbolizes the fountain that
was in the backyard of Diane and Ray McGeorge. Many Federationists sat out
on the McGeorge deck and received the teaching and mentoring of these two
leaders while listening to their fountain. By including a fountain in this
space, we hope that another generation of leaders will share in
intergenerational conversations with this auditory backdrop.
Calder Brannock, the artist from the District of Columbia who created
the fountain, describes it this way:
This triangular boulder, measuring fifty inches tall, gained its
reddish hue from the iron in the riverbed from which it was pulled,
and its surface smoothed for centuries by the flowing water. Placed
upright over a basin, the stone will continue to shift and develop as
water again flows across it in its new home. The artist spent weeks
visiting quarries to find the perfect piece of Maryland sandstone. The
stone is raised off the floor of the fountain's basin by twelve
inches, making the whole structure five feet tall. The stone is cut
with a flat base for stability and drilled so the tube for the water
will travel up the center of the stone. The pump for the fountain is
submerged in the water, limiting/eliminating its noise. The basin is
filled halfway with water to amplify the noise and catch any splash.
The fountain fits into the surrounding bookshelves and disappears into
the room's architecture.
Casual Space
When you came east through the foyer, you found two glass doors. When
you go through those doors, you are transitioning from the foyer to the
sleeping rooms and casual spaces. Immediately in front of you is a tiled
wall. This is the backside of the entertainment wall for the family room.
If you turned left (north) and followed this short hallway, you would come
to the carpet that designates the corridor for the sleeping rooms. If you
turn right (south) and make your way around the wall in front of you, you
will enter the open family room.
Family Room
This large open area provides a relaxing space for Federationists to
gather in a more casual setting. At the south end is a brick wall that was
exposed as part of the remodeling. The exposed brick wall runs seventy feet
long. From west to east (right to left) along this brick wall, you will
find the emergency exit door, a utility closet, the Barney Street elevator
(which provides access to the courtyard rooms), and then a restroom. At the
far west end of the corridor that runs along the brick wall is a storage
closet, and at the far east end is the west entrance to the fitness room.
Another memento of the building's history is the "fire escape" sign
currently hanging next to the emergency exit door in the brick wall. When
the ceiling over the dining room was opened for the first time in many
decades, this sign was discovered-pointing the way to what would have been
the fire escape when the building was first constructed.
The center of the family room includes fourteen-foot ceilings, an
entertainment wall with seating on a carpeted area, and a number of tables
and chairs. There are two exposed columns in this space. The family room
has a natural transition to the east to a kitchen and counter space. The
entire family room and kitchen is nearly 2,200 square feet. At the north
end of this space is the carpeted corridor for the sleeping rooms. The
family room/kitchen space is separated from the corridor by vertical metal
panels that have a series of holes punched out. These holes are in sets of
six to match oversized Braille cells. Hundreds of racquetballs are
available for visitors to insert into the holes to make Braille messages in
the wall. There are a number of breaks between the panels so that the
sleeping room corridor can be easily accessed.
Kitchen
The kitchen is intended to be used for training or by visitors during
their stay. The west side of the kitchen features a seventeen-foot-long,
high-top counter that runs from north to south. The counter accommodates
twelve people on barstools. The countertop is equipped with electrical
outlets. Above the countertop are pendant lights hanging from the ceiling.
The east side of the kitchen includes appliances, a sink, and cabinets. A
Keurig coffee maker is available on this counter.
Fitness Room
At the far south end of the kitchen wall (east side of the family
room/kitchen) is one entrance to the fitness room. If you enter the fitness
room at this point, you are facing east. If you travel straight ahead, you
will come to the other entrance for the fitness room. Along the wall on
your right side, you will find some storage spaces for visitors to keep
things while they are using the fitness room. During the remodeling, we
discovered a rainbow painted on the masonry wall that is now covered by new
drywall. An envelope containing a letter in Braille and print has been
affixed to the masonry wall to be discovered in the future when the wall is
redone. The letter was written by Mark Riccobono who served as President of
the National Federation of the Blind and President of the Jacobus tenBroek
Memorial Fund during the time of the remodeling project.
Immediately on your left are two single-user shower rooms separated
by a water fountain (that includes a spout for filling water bottles). To
the east of the shower rooms, the fitness area opens into a thirty-foot by
forty-foot fitness area including a variety of exercise equipment. The
flooring in this space is a dense rubber floor typically found in spaces
like this.
If you exit the fitness room through the door at the east end, you
come to a carpeted corridor. Following the carpet in front of you will lead
you to the sleeping rooms (room 20 is in front of you). Immediately to your
left is an entrance to the hang out (this room does not have a door).
Immediately to your right is a set of double doors that lead into the
Johnson Street wing offices. If you go through those doors and follow the
wall around to the left and go to the end of the hall, you will find the
emergency exit to the Johnson Street stairwell (this doorway was for many
years the primary entrance to our offices). The Johnson Street stairwell
leads to an exit onto Johnson Street, accessible by taking the stairs or
elevator to the second floor.
Hang Out
This brightly decorated room measures twenty-five by nineteen feet
and is intended to be a quieter space for working or, well, just hanging
out. In contrast to the family room and kitchen spaces, which are very
public and open, the hang out is intended to be a smaller, quieter, public
space. Along the west wall of the room is a long desk space and cabinetry.
Come here to sit with your laptop, use the Braille embosser, or take a
phone call. Also along this wall is an amateur radio station. This station
was designed by the National Federation of the Blind Amateur Radio
Division. It has been dedicated to Rachel Olivero (AD9O) who served as
president of the division as well as the Federation's director of
organizational technology until her passing in February 2019. While Rachel
was only thirty-six years old, her love for and impact on the members of
the organized blind movement was significant. It was her dream to have this
station that helped bring it into reality. The east side of this room
includes a variety of comfortable seating and eclectic lighting. The walls
of the room include felt panels to give it a bright look and to absorb
sound.
Sleeping Rooms
Surrounding the casual areas is a carpeted hallway that runs along
the north and east sides with a small wraparound at the south leading to
the east entrance of the fitness room. There are twenty-one sleeping rooms
along the north and east walls. The rooms begin with number one at the far
west end of the north wall, incrementing in order to the east and
continuing to the south along the east wall. For reference, when you come
into the casual space from the foyer and turn to the north, you are walking
towards room 2. When you come to the carpet, you would turn left to get to
room number 1 and right to get to the higher number rooms. Rooms 1 to 14
run along the north. They each include an entry space with a couch that
converts to a full-size bed when needed, and a bedroom space with two twin-
size beds past the bathroom. Rooms 16 to 20 are found along the east wall.
These smaller rooms include two beds. Rooms 6 and 12 are the largest rooms
and are ADA-accessible. Rooms 5 and 6 are designed to be hypoallergenic.
Room 15 is a two-bedroom suite with a shared bathroom. This room includes
15A and 15B to designate the two separate bedrooms. Every room includes at
least one large window measuring roughly six feet square. The rooms have
been designed to minimize noise. The hallway walls in the sleeping room
area are painted a sandy color called Intellectual Gray, while the walls
around the doors are light blue (AquaSphere). The changes in hallway color
are demarcated by a "reveal," a metal floor-to-ceiling accent molding. The
sleeping room doors and frames are a bright cobalt blue (Oceanside). Rooms
include motion-sensing LED lights with push button controls and climate
control panels. The goal is to eventually give each sleeping room a theme
related to the history and advancement of the organized blind movement.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Julie Deden standing next to the fountain]
A Mountain, a Waterfall, a Cracked Pool, and a Christmas Tree Color Wheel
by Ray McGeorge
From the Editor: This article was originally published in the
February 2006 issue of the Braille Monitor. In honor of our new fountain,
we reprint it here, along with the original editor's note:
Editor's Note: Ray McGeorge is the first vice president of the
National Organization of the Senior Blind. He has been a leader in the
National Federation of the Blind for several decades. He is also one of
those guys we would all love to have living near us; he does plumbing,
electrical work, and machine design and building. He is also an amateur
architect. Here is his account of creating a backyard fountain:
More than four decades ago, my wife Diane and I were visiting her
family. One member had a patio. When I stepped out the door, I could hear
the sound of water and a motor. I was told that the motor was powering a
pump that forced water up so that it could then fall into the pool below. I
got down on my hands and knees and examined the pool and the rocks which
served as a backdrop for the waterfall. I really liked the whole setup
except for one thing.
I am convinced that most sighted folks simply look at things without
noticing the racket they add to the environment. The pump on that patio was
noisy. As a blind person I found that the noise detracted from the beauty
of the falling water. I was beginning to form a plan in my mind. I really
liked everything about that waterfall except that pump motor noise.
At this point I must mention that my wife and I own two apartments.
We live in one of them; the other has been rented to the same woman for
many years. I found a big fish tank in our basement, so I asked our tenant
whether the previous owners had had fish. She said they had and that they
had also had several ponds in the backyard. She also told me that at some
point they had filled the ponds in with dirt and old cement from the pond
sides.
Since I had been thinking about how much I wanted a pool with a
waterfall, I went out in the yard with a heavy, sharp tool and began to
search for the sound of cement. It took a lot of heavy banging and
clanging. The neighbors probably thought I had lost my mind, but I was not
deterred. Finally I located a pond that was almost ten feet square and
about two feet deep. It took a lot of work, but I dug out all the dirt and
broken concrete. I decided to use debris to create the little mountain I
wanted to build on two sides of the pool. In my mind I pictured the peak of
the mountain at one corner. However, the building material I had at hand
was insufficient for my purposes.
Let me digress for a minute to tell you about my next-door neighbors.
They were young and managed the apartments in which they lived. But they
had no yard. Diane and I began inviting them to bring over their food and
share our patio at dinnertime. The couple became interested in my pool
project, which was visible from where we sat.
They had an old truck. Being blind, I asked them for help with
transportation. They said they would be glad to drive me to the nearby
mountains so I could examine boulders to use to form the base of my
mountain. I found some as big as three feet in diameter; it took two of us
to lift them into the truck. I also made sure that the boulders were
interesting colors.
Since the peak of my mountain was to be in one corner, I wanted the
mountain rounded, jutting out into the pool. My neighbors helped me place
the rocks where I wanted them. This was a long, backbreaking project, but
we all survived with our backs still functioning.
As a machinist by trade, I already had some of the skills I needed.
One of my neighbors was a steam fitter. He became very interested in the
project and donated a lot of one-inch pipe, which I badly needed. I was not
rich in those days. However, I still had to purchase a goodly amount of
plastic pipe to carry the water across the yard and into the basement to an
old coal bin. I wanted that noisy pump far from my waterfall. I had to
drill two holes through my house foundation, one to take the water from the
pool, the other to pump it back out for the waterfall-about one hundred
feet.
Remember, the pipe for the waterfall was on the inside of the little
mountain. At the very peak I worked on the pipe with a file until I had a
fan-shaped opening for the waterfall. I worked on the opening until the
waterfall was about three feet wide. I finally controlled the water flow so
it made a gentle sound as the water hit the pool, but it took a lot of
work. The first time I turned on the waterfall, the water shot out with
such force that it watered the entire yard. After many adjustments and
tests, I found the flow level I wanted. I was simply overjoyed when I
walked over to my patio and could hear the water clearly but not the pump
motor. Boy, was I happy!
After I had all the rocks, dirt, driftwood, and plants in place, I
installed a thirty-inch-high chain-link fence. We had two young children,
so I did not want any accidents with the pool. As the children grew, they
learned to climb over the fence, but by then they understood water safety.
You may think this is the end of this story, but not yet. My wife and
I are blind, but we entertain sighted guests on our patio during the
summer, so one evening, when we were sitting out there with the water
splashing, it occurred to me that lighting for the waterfall might be nice.
I hunted around and finally found a Christmas color wheel. I decided
to build a small rock garden in the pool corner, diagonally across from the
waterfall. I built a form to house the color wheel and then cemented rocks
around it. For twenty seconds one sees blue, then green, and so on. Our
guests say that they like the colored lights. To complete the job, I put
two switches inside the patio door: one for the waterfall and the other for
the lights. Then the job was complete. Well, almost. I did have to build a
fence behind the mountain so that the shed could not be seen. I then
painted it green and trained a pretty vine with red berries to cover the
fence.
Imagine how much we enjoyed this backyard beauty for thirty years.
But after three decades I began to notice that the waterfall was not
flowing at full force. I knew that the problem was that plastic pipe was
supposed to last only a couple of decades. So there I was, digging a trench
instead of rocking in my retirement chair. I had never thought I would be
working so hard, but what choice did I have?
I forgot to say that the pool was painted a pretty blue. Please notice
that I used the verb was, for there is one more segment to this tale. When
the water level in the pool began dropping, I knew what was wrong. The old
pool was leaking. I refused to do any more work. I simply drained the pool
and hired a company to come and apply a plastic layer to the interior.
The coming of the halfway mark of fall last weekend brought the end
of listening to the waterfall for another year because the pipes must be
drained for winter. We enjoyed our last supper on the patio listening to
the music of the falling water. But, when spring comes around next year, we
will have the joy of hearing our longtime project come to life once again.
With my wife's and my NFB philosophy, we knew we could design, build, and
ultimately enjoy bringing a mountain and a waterfall into our backyard.
Perhaps the day will come when we cannot physically do the repairs needed.
Then we will hire workers to do the job under our direction.
Yes, I do believe that at our house we have truly changed what it
means to be blind. We recruited and organized sighted people to help with
the driving, lifting, and so on, but we were the bosses, and the sighted
were the helpers. Blind people love beauty, and we know how to create it.
----------
Leave a Legacy
For more than seventy-five years the National Federation of the Blind
has worked to transform the dreams of hundreds of thousands of blind people
into reality, and with your support we will continue to do so for decades
to come. We sincerely hope you will plan to be a part of our enduring
movement by adding the National Federation of the Blind as a partial
beneficiary in your will. A gift to the National Federation of the Blind in
your will is more than just a charitable, tax-deductible donation. It is a
way to join in the work to help blind people live the lives they want that
leaves a lasting imprint on the lives of thousands of blind children and
adults.
With your help, the NFB will continue to:
. Give blind children the gift of literacy through Braille;
. Promote the independent travel of the blind by providing free, long
white canes to blind people in need;
. Develop dynamic educational projects and programs that show blind
youth that science and math are within their reach;
. Deliver hundreds of accessible newspapers and magazines to provide
blind people the essential information necessary to be actively
involved in their communities;
. Offer aids and appliances that help seniors losing vision maintain
their independence; and
. Fund scholarship programs so that blind people can achieve their
dreams.
Plan to Leave a Legacy
Creating a will gives you the final say in what happens to your
possessions and is the only way to be sure that your remaining assets are
distributed according to your passions and beliefs. Many people fear
creating a will or believe it's not necessary until they are much older.
Others think that it's expensive and confusing. However, it is one of the
most important things you will do, and with new online legal programs it is
easier and cheaper than ever before. If you do decide to create or revise
your will, consider the National Federation of the Blind as a partial
beneficiary. Visit www.nfb.org/planned-giving or call 410-659-9314,
extension 2422, for more information. Together with love, hope,
determination, and your support, we will continue to transform dreams into
reality.
Invest in Opportunity
The National Federation of the Blind knows that blindness is not the
characteristic that defines you or your future. You can live the life you
want; blindness is not what holds you back. A donation to the National
Federation of the Blind allows you to invest in a movement that removes the
fear from blindness. Your investment is your vote of confidence in the
value and capacity of blind people and reflects the high expectations we
have for all blind Americans, combating the low expectations that create
obstacles between blind people and our dreams.
In 2018 the NFB:
. Distributed over seven thousand canes to blind people across the
United States, empowering them to travel safely and independently
throughout their communities.
. Hosted forty-eight NFB BELL Academy programs, which served more than
three hundred and fifty blind students throughout the United States.
. Provided over one hundred thousand dollars in scholarships to blind
students, making a post-secondary education affordable and attainable.
. Delivered audio newspaper and magazine services to 118,900
subscribers, providing free access to over four hundred local,
national, and international publications.
. In the third year of the program, over three hundred fifty Braille-
writing slates and styluses were given free of charge to blind users.
Just imagine what we'll do next year, and, with your help, what can
be accomplished for years to come. Below are just a few of the many
diverse, tax-deductible ways you can lend your support to the National
Federation of the Blind.
Vehicle Donation Program
The NFB now accepts donated vehicles, including cars, trucks, boats,
motorcycles, or recreational vehicles. Just call 855-659-9314 toll-free,
and a representative can make arrangements to pick up your donation-it
doesn't have to be working. We can also answer any questions you have.
General Donation
General donations help support the ongoing programs of the NFB and
the work to help blind people live the lives they want. Donate online with
a credit card or through the mail with check or money order. Visit
www.nfb.org/make-gift for more information.
Bequests
Even if you can't afford a gift right now, including the National
Federation of the Blind in your will enables you to contribute by
expressing your commitment to the organization and promises support for
future generations of blind people across the country. Visit
www.nfb.org/planned-giving or call 410-659-9314, extension 2422, for more
information.
Pre-Authorized Contribution
Through the Pre-Authorized Contribution (PAC) program, supporters
sustain the efforts of the National Federation of the Blind by making
recurring monthly donations by direct withdraw of funds from a checking
account or a charge to a credit card. To enroll, visit www.nfb.org/make-
gift, and complete the Pre-Authorized Contribution form, and return it to
the address listed on the form.
----------
Vote by Mail Ballot Now Accessible to Blind Coloradans
by Curtis Chong
From the Editor: when many of us think of Curtis Chong, we think of
his stellar work as the director of technology at the National Federation
of the Blind and his longtime leadership of the National Federation of the
Blind Computer Science Division. But Curtis cannot be pigeonholed by
technology. He is a Federationist who participates in every aspect of the
organization, and here is what he has to say about voting in Colorado:
There are four states in this country where elections are held
entirely by mail. These include Oregon (2000), Washington (2011), Colorado
(2013), and Hawaii (2019). Every registered voter receives a ballot in the
mail. The voter marks the ballot, puts it in a secrecy envelope or sleeve
and then into a separate mailing envelope, signs an affidavit on the
exterior of the mailing envelope, and returns the package via mail or by
dropping the package off at an authorized location or drop box. Think of
this as an absentee ballot for everyone.
A blind Coloradan who cannot see the printed mail ballot must either
find someone to help mark the ballot (hardly a secret ballot in this case)
or travel to a polling facility where the accessible equipment might or
might not work. Even if the equipment at the polling facility does work,
most of us are nowhere as familiar with the voting system's nonvisual
access technology as we are with the technology we use on our smart phones
and computers.
Following on the heels of Maryland and New Mexico, the National
Federation of the Blind of Colorado determined that the time had come for
the printed mail ballot to be accessible to the blind and other voters with
disabilities. With the incredible help and support of our good friend
Senator Jessie Danielson, SB19-202 was adopted by the Colorado General
Assembly without any opposition, $50,000 was appropriated, and on May 29,
the bill was signed into law by Colorado Governor Jared Polis. SB19-202
states, in relevant part:
"The secretary of state shall establish procedures to enable a voter
with a disability to independently and privately mark a ballot or use
an electronic voting device that produces a paper record using
nonvisual access, low-vision access, or other assistive technology in
order for the voter to vote in a mail ballot election...The procedures
shall include a method, to be determined by the secretary of state, by
which a voter with a disability may request such a ballot...A voter
with a disability who receives a ballot pursuant to this
subsection...must print the ballot sent by electronic transmission and
such ballot must be received by the election official in the
applicable jurisdiction before the close of polls on the day of the
election."
As any blind person who has worked with websites knows, it is not a
given that a particular site will work well with our screen reading and
magnification technology. Hence, we determined early on that we should
prevail upon the Colorado Secretary of State to involve our members in the
testing of the system before it was rolled out to the public. A number of
our members had a chance to test the system. We identified a few problems,
and most of them were addressed in time for the statewide coordinated
election held on November 5. We are confident that by the time of the
primary election on March 3, 2020, all of the issues we have identified
will be fixed.
Unlike the online ballot-marking tools in Maryland and New Mexico,
the Colorado system gives voters with disabilities immediate access to the
ballot as soon as printed ballots are sent out in the mail. The voter goes
to a specific website, provides verifying credentials, and is presented
with the online ballot. There is no waiting for a link to the ballot to be
emailed. Once the ballot has been marked and reviewed, the voter prints
both the ballot and the ballot application. While the ballot application is
filled out by the online system, the voter still has to sign it. Some
voters might need help with the signing process, but the secrecy of the
ballot is still maintained.
For those people who say that there is a problem for anyone who
doesn't have access to a printer, I have found that (at least in Windows)
the printing of the ballot and accompanying ballot application can be saved
as two separate PDF files. These files can then be copied to a flash drive.
You can take the flash drive to a facility with a computer and a printer.
In conclusion, I would be pleased to share any and all information
with anyone who wants to make the printed mail or absentee ballot
accessible in his/her state. There are financial and technical
considerations involved in doing this, but the overall impact to a state's
budget is, as I see it, negligible. The important principle to keep in mind
is prior testing before implementation. Be sure that real live blind voters
have an opportunity to try the system before it goes live and work actively
with the people who are involved with the design, development, and support
of this new system. In this way, you can ensure that whatever is rolled out
will be both accessible and usable.
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Voting Letter to Secretaries of State
by Lou Ann Blake
From the Editor: Lou Ann Blake is the very active and visible person
at our national headquarters who monitors the enforcement of the Help
America Vote Act. From other articles that have appeared here, you will
remember that she is a person with tremendous knowledge about voting
options for blind people and a very passionate advocate to see that we can
vote privately, independently, and anonymously. Here is what she says:
Currently, the majority of states do not provide blind and low-vision
voters with an accessible way to mark an absentee ballot. As an activity
under our Help America Vote Act (HAVA) grant from the US Department of
Health and Human Services, we recently sent a letter to the secretary of
state for these states to remind them of their obligation to provide
accessible absentee voting as required by Title II of the Americans with
Disabilities Act and recent court decisions in cases brought by the NFB in
Maryland and Ohio. The letter is printed here for your information. If you
receive any feedback from your secretary of state or state elections
officials in response to this letter, or if you have questions about
accessible absentee voting, please contact Lou Ann Blake, deputy director
of Blindness Initiatives at lblake at nfb.org or 410-659-9314, extension 2221.
September 27, 2019
Dear Secretary:
The National Federation of the Blind seeks to protect the rights of
blind and low-vision voters, both at the polls and when absentee voting. It
is vital to our democracy that all citizens are able to exercise the right
to cast a secret ballot independently. Unfortunately, the right of many
absentee voters with disabilities to mark their ballots privately and
independently continues to be denied due to the implementation of
inaccessible systems that require them to depend on others to assist them
in the ballot-marking process. In advance of the 2020 elections, I am
writing to remind you of your obligation, as required by federal law and
recent court decisions, to provide voters with print disabilities an
accessible way to privately and independently mark an absentee ballot.
Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires states
to ensure that voters with disabilities are offered an opportunity to vote-
whether in person or by absentee ballot-that is equal to the opportunity
offered to voters without disabilities. Thus, if all other voters can vote
absentee privately and independently, voters with disabilities must be
offered the same opportunity. Furthermore, Section 504 of the
Rehabilitation Act states that public entities that receive federal
financial assistance may not discriminate against people with disabilities
in their programs, services, or activities. The law on this issue,
particularly in the Fourth Circuit, is quite clear. In National Federation
of the Blind v. Lamone, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth
Circuit held that the Maryland State Board of Elections violated Title II
of the ADA and Section 504 by providing only a paper absentee ballot that
was inaccessible to people with print and dexterity disabilities, while
refusing to allow access to a ballot marking tool that would grant them the
same opportunity provided to voters without disabilities to mark their
absentee ballot independently (see the attached opinion). Ballot-marking
tools allow voters to mark an electronic version of the absentee ballot on
devices such as computers, tablets, or smartphones. No votes are cast
electronically; voters must still print and mail in their ballots to have
their votes counted.
The Fourth Circuit explained that the opportunity to mark an absentee
ballot privately and independently was a benefit that the Maryland State
Board of Elections provided to voters without disabilities but denied
voters with disabilities on the basis of their disability. It was of no
consequence that Maryland made other methods of voting, like in-person
voting, available to voters with disabilities on an equal basis. The right
to vote absentee privately and independently was a distinct benefit, and
the denial of this opportunity was "precisely the sort of harm the ADA
seeks to prevent." Nat'l Fed'n of the Blind v. Lamone, 813 F.3d 494, 506
(4th Cir. 2016). The opinion further states "that by effectively requiring
disabled individuals to rely on the assistance of others to vote absentee,
defendants have not provided plaintiffs with meaningful access to
Maryland's absentee voting program." Id. at 507.
The Fourth Circuit also noted that state law, such as a requirement
that voting systems be certified, does not exempt "public entities from
making otherwise reasonable modifications to prevent disability
discrimination" because the "Constitution's Supremacy Clause establishes
that valid federal legislation can pre-empt state laws." Id. at 508. The
Sixth Circuit in the recent case, Hindel v. Husted, also found that
certification procedures required by state law could not block enforcement
of the ADA when it comes to the right to vote absentee on an equal basis.
See Hindel v. Husted, 875 F.3d 344, 349 (6th Cir. 2017).
Currently, there are a number of accessible absentee ballot-marking
systems available for use in US elections. The Maryland State Board of
Elections makes its accessible ballot-marking tool available at no charge.
Five Cedars, Democracy Live, Dominion Voting, and Prime III are examples of
vendors that can also provide absentee ballot-marking systems. Many of
these systems have now met Ohio and California's certification requirements
for election technology. Given the requirements of the ADA and Section 504,
as well as the wide availability of accessible ballot marking systems, I
strongly encourage you to implement such a system for use in the 2020
elections, and all subsequent federal, state, and local elections in which
absentee voting is available. The National Federation of the Blind will be
monitoring the availability of accessible absentee voting through our 2020
national blind voter survey, and subsequent surveys following each
presidential general election.
Voters with disabilities must be considered as you design and plan
your absentee voting process. Providing an accessible ballot-marking tool
will guarantee that people with disabilities have an opportunity to cast
their ballots privately and independently that is equal to the opportunity
provided to voters without disabilities, as required by the ADA. The
National Federation of the Blind is available as you consider the
accessibility of your current absentee voting system. We welcome an
opportunity to advise you on the development, or in the procurement
process, of an accessible ballot-marking tool.
Please do not hesitate to contact us with questions, or if you need
assistance with the implementation of accessible absentee voting.
Sincerely,
Mark A. Riccobono, President
National Federation of the Blind
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Maurice Peret]
Anger or Righteous Indignation
by Maurice Peret
From the Editor: Maurice Peret is an active member of our
organization, serving as a staff member of the Blind Initiatives Team and
chairing the Committee on Automobile and Pedestrian Safety. What Maurice
writes about in this article is timely, and I hope it encourages each of us
to express our political opinions while at the same time placing uppermost
in our Federation activity the importance of working in harmony to advance
the integration of the blind. Here's what he says:
As a member of the National Federation of the Blind for approaching
thirty years now, I came to the organized blind movement already with a
developing set of values and beliefs which shaped my character as an
activist as well as my intellectual worldview. I have enjoyed a profound
sense of freedom of expression through the well-established democratic
structure and process of our Federation. I relish the fellowship in common
cause with intelligent colleagues with whom, under any other circumstances,
I would find little in common due to our divergent views.
I marvel at the example which stands in contrast to the current toxic
social atmosphere afoot in our nation. It is by now almost a clich� to the
point of being platitudinal to reference the present era of discourse in
which we find ourselves. The adjectives that come to mind include coarse,
vitriolic, divisive, and partisan, particularly in the realm of government
and popular media. One resulting manifestation of this era of rhetoric is
punctuated by anger. The online www.dictionary.com defines anger as a noun
meaning "a strong feeling of displeasure and belligerence aroused by a
wrong; wrath; ire."
As I recall my childhood, I had a rather allusive relationship with
anger, repressed in the form of passive aggressive rebellion. I attribute
this, at least in part, to a prevalent misunderstanding about my blindness.
My parents were divorced when I was eight years old, and I grew up with
many of the challenges that one might expect from being raised in a single
parent home. I got into trouble just as much-well, maybe more-than other
kids my age. Living in the suburban Washington, DC, Northern Virginia area,
I was the only blind student, so far as I was aware, in each of the public
schools that I attended. None of the adults around me ever seemed to use
the term "blind." Instead, I was always referred to as "partially sighted."
This impresses upon me now the conviction that this was a psychological
trick. I actually thought I was nearer to sighted than blind, and I was not
discouraged from reliance upon visual methods to accomplish tasks when
perfectly viable nonvisual alternative techniques would have better served
me. I had no adult blind role models to look up to or emulate back then.
There were plenty of anecdotes about popular blind celebrities, but I found
them and their accomplishments far beyond my reach. I wrestled with the
inequality of expectations between me and my peers. When I would get into
mischief for which there were consequences to face, for example, I was
often "let off," or excused out of misplaced sympathy. In my adolescent
rebellious mind, I grew outraged and even resentful at not being allowed to
fail in the same way that my peers around me were. They were not always so
fastidious in reminding me of this fact from time to time.
But for another parallel development in my life to counterbalance the
anger was a growing sense of righteous indignation which would eventually
save me from a potentially reckless and destructive dead-end path of an
angry young man.
Wikipedia defines righteous indignation as "typically a reactive
emotion of anger over mistreatment, insult, or malice of another. It is
akin to what is called the sense of injustice. In some Christian doctrines,
righteous indignation is considered the only form of anger which is not
sinful, e.g., when Jesus drove the money lenders out of the temple (Gospel
of Matthew 21)." My earliest memory is of a keen interest in biographies. I
read a book at the age of eight years old about the life of Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr. This would have been just five years after his
assassination on April 4, 1968, at the age of thirty-nine in Memphis. Until
shortly before that time, I had lived with my family on the military base
at Ft. Myer, Virginia. It is worth recalling that it was the United States
Military, following World War II, in 1948 in an executive order signed by
President Harry S. Truman that established the President's Committee on
Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Services, becoming the
first American institution to integrate men and women of all racial
backgrounds. I was therefore shocked to learn that kids like the young MLK
were summarily exposed to such terrible treatment simply on the arbitrary
basis of their skin color. A few years later I read Bury My Heart at
Wounded Knee, which was heartbreaking in its depiction of the well-
documented genocidal warfare against the indigenous peoples of this land.
What I found even more disturbing was the discovery that the struggles of
native, African American, and Latin American peoples continued to the
present day. When I read the classic The Jungle by Upton Sinclair,
published in 1906, I was captivated by the backdrop of rising political
movements of the time and the establishment of labor organizations in
response to horrific working and living conditions of the early twentieth
century Chicago stockyards.
Here's the thing: If we can just get to a place beyond ideology where
views can be shared civilly without venom or vitriol, perhaps we might come
to some better understanding about where we are as a society, at least for
those of us who occupy our mental energy with such things. There are a
couple of main factors that lead me to increasingly conclude that
capitalism, as a dominant world system, is beginning to show signs of
serious decay. To my way of thinking, a historic precedence was established
in the aftermath of the great worldwide depression in the 1930s. President
Franklin Roosevelt confronted a tremendous dilemma in the land. In the wake
of a gilded class of robber barons, there was a strong and growing social
and progressive political movement in the country, based on organizations
of labor, academic and intellectual communities, a substantial number and
powerful portion of whom were avowed socialists and communists. Records of
personal correspondence between President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his
associates of the time revealed open concerns about a pre-revolutionary
environment. Himself a secure member of the gilded elite, Roosevelt opted,
against great political opposition, to offer massive concessions to the
working poor and comparatively small middle classes. It amounted to a
massive political and economic reform of capitalism, assisted in no small
portion by the great carnage of World War II. Divisions among progressives
lead to capitulation to the New Deal and ultimately a route of the most
left elements of these progressives, paving the way for reactionary and
destructive McCarthyism, from which we have, in my opinion, never since
recovered. These historic concessions taxed the income of the wealthiest in
our nation during the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration at a whopping
rate of-wait for it-91 percent. It's true, you can look it up. What was
accomplished was the purchase of a nearly half century of social peace that
led to growing prosperity and collective bargaining power of a working
class made up of women who found themselves working, for the first time in
the nation's history, outside the home, as well as combat veterans, among
them, newly integrated black soldiers coming home to old Jim Crow; this is
where the true civil rights movement began.
In the emergence of a new Gilded Age, not of industrial capitalists
but this time of finance speculators (read the great world recession of
2008), wherein many of the regulatory building blocks of the New Deal
reforms were systematically dismantled replaced by a new form of social
control and revenue generating exploitation through the mass incarceration
of overwhelmingly black and brown people, thanks to the war on drugs.
The Trump administration is openly challenging the limits of checks
and balances in our democracy and threatening the social peace won by the
New Deal. More Americans are aware of problems with our electoral process
that many consider voter repression of mostly minority communities.
Meanwhile we hear more and more from some among the billionaire one
percenters that the way things are going, with out-of-control economic
inequality and complete tax exemption providing corporations a virtual free
ride, is unsustainable. The point is that the way we are headed is not
sustainable, and a possible outcome could again present a historic choice:
reform or revolution. Given what we know about the nation's path, what will
it look like for the next generation?
It should come as no surprise, then, that I should have become an
activist early on in my life. While attending Ball State University in
Muncie, Indiana, in the mid-1980s, I met a group of young socialist
organizers, and I quickly got involved. As a union and political activist
after leaving college, I fought and campaigned to get jobs in union-
organized factories where blind workers were virtually unheard of. Inspired
by the chronicled history of the first fifty years of the organized blind
movement in the book entitled Walking Alone and Marching Together, I
hungrily read about the organizing drives of blind workers in sheltered
workshops from Cincinnati, Houston, and Chicago. I learned about Federation
leaders like machinists Dick Edlund, Ray McGeorge, and Ted Hart who retired
from the John Deere Corporation. My restless sense of adventure led me to
many interesting places from the coal mining town of Morgantown, West
Virginia, where I worked for an hourly piece rate as a pressor and union
member in a shirt factory, to the farming and meat-packing region of Des
Moines, Iowa, where I worked as an assembler in a vending machine factory
that was organized by a United Automobile Workers union local. I came into
contact with so many extremely interesting people. For example, through my
work in the US based anti-Apartheid movement in collaboration with exiled
members of the African National Congress, I stood just twenty feet from the
recently released twenty-seven-year imprisoned Nelson Mandela and his
delegation at the Washington, DC, AFL-CIO headquarters. Mandela would
become South Africa's first popularly elected black president.
I fondly recall the only face-to-face meeting I ever had with the
late Dr. Kenneth Jernigan in 1993. Living in Des Moines, Iowa, at the time,
I was visiting the DC and Baltimore area and decided to drop in,
unannounced, to meet Dr. Jernigan with a specific purpose in mind.
Astonishingly, Dr. Jernigan agreed to meet with me. I explained that there
was a newspaper that I supported and read with the help of a few volunteers
who recorded it on cassette tape every week, and I wanted to publicize the
availability of this resource in the Braille Monitor. After a lengthy
discussion about editorial policies and procedures as they had to do with
the NFB, and once I made my pitch, I well remember Dr. Jernigan's question
to me in response. He asked me who I thought made the editorial decisions
about the Monitor. I answered that I knew that Barbara Pierce was the
editor and that I had been in discussions with her about the matter. Dr.
Jernigan said that this was not his question. Catching his drift, I
sheepishly answered that I supposed that it was he, Dr. Jernigan, who made
those decisions. The conversation went on for an hour and covered many
other topics and ended with what I received as a high compliment. Despite
openly representing my political views, which it is quite safe to say
differed considerably from his own, Dr. Jernigan asked me why I was not
more visible at the national convention of the NFB. The fact was that I had
not yet attended my first convention, which would not occur sadly until
after his untimely passing in 1998. I subsequently attended the 1999 annual
convention in Atlanta, deeply and sadly conscious of his absence. I will
always cherish my one and only memory of the charismatic Dr. Jernigan and
have strived to affirmatively answer his question put to me ever since.
Before leaving Dr. Jernigan's office that fateful day back in 1993
and making sure he did not forget my request to have the announcement of
the weekly volunteer recording of the newspaper I supported, I asked one
final time whether he would allow it. In yet another test of my capacity to
communicate as a blind person, Dr. Jernigan answered that I should leave
the text at the front desk in Braille and he would see. I took out my
seldom used slate and stylus and scribed the text of what I wanted the
announcement to read. You might be as curious as I was for weeks
thereafter. In a subsequent issue of the Braille Monitor, there was my
announcement just as I had left it for him, errors and all. In 2020 I will
attend my twenty-second consecutive convention.
Through my well-cultivated job search experiences, I derived a great
deal of skill and confidence in pursuing jobs and adapting to varied work
environments. During one period of unemployment while living in West
Virginia, I learned firsthand what it was like to work for subminimum wages
in a sheltered workshop. There was an outfit nestled in the coal mining
mountains. Unemployment was quite high there, even compared to the above
national average rate of joblessness across the state. There were several
menial tasks that were set up for the two dozen or so workers employed
there. One of the main jobs included making roof bolts that were used to
secure the ceiling in underground mines. This involved using a mallet to
hammer in dowels into steel bolts which sat in a vat of oily soup. The
hourly piece rate was calculated supposedly according to what an "able
bodied" individual was capable of producing in an hour. It is important to
bear in mind that I had accumulated several years of experience working in
private competitive industrial settings by then, so when I was timed at
$1.53, I was quietly outraged. I held my tongue about it, though, because
after all, a job was a job, and this was certainly not a union outfit. Some
of those who were employed there had intellectual or developmental
disabilities. Others, I discovered, including a worker with no apparent
disability, had been employed in a foundry for nearly twenty years. The
company had since been shuttered and had numerous cases of asbestos
poisoning lawsuits pending against them, this gentleman among the
plaintiffs. To add insult to injury, after a few weeks working there, I was
laid off.
I also experienced employment discrimination when I applied to work
as a packager at a local pharmaceutical plant well-known for its production
of generic drugs. After going through two consecutive interviews, widely
considered a virtual shoe-in around the area, I was explicitly denied
employment in writing solely on the basis of being blind. In retrospect, I
sometimes wish I had pursued the offer of legal assistance from the
National Federation of the Blind. My primary focus at the time was to get a
job, however, and I was not prepared to commit the time it would surely
require to bring such an action, even if successful, to fruition.
As a student of history and an observer of social and political
movements, I am extremely proud of the National Federation of the Blind's
place in the history of the civil rights movement in our nation. This
includes the many contributions of our founding President, Dr. Jacobus
tenBroek, forever changing equal protection of citizens under the
Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution as interpreted by the Supreme
Court. I am proud of our determinant fight against the mistreatment and
injustice of all people with disabilities by the exploitive and immoral
practice of payment of subminimum wages and subhuman treatment. I am proud
of our continuity of powerful leadership through Dr. Kenneth Jernigan, Dr.
Marc Maurer, and our current talented President, Mark Riccobono.
Woven into the rich history of our yet young nation is a legacy of
resistance to injustices of all kinds. Despite derailing philosophies that
erupted from McCarthyism, which all but erased the public knowledge of
popular resistance movements to present-day conspiracy theories designed to
detract from the real issues that face us all, I am proud to stand strong
with tens of thousands of my brothers and sisters in the Federation who are
willing and able to make the necessary changes to empower us to live the
lives we want.
I recognize and appreciate that my views on such matters are not
widely shared by everyone in our movement nor in our society. I acknowledge
that there are many traditions in our society which reflect different
experiences and perspectives than my own. All the same, I am proud to be
guided by a strong code of conduct that embraces diversity with respect for
divergent differences of opinion, beliefs, identities, and other
characteristics. What we stand for demonstrates that we who are blind are a
diverse cross section of society. I am excited by the prospect of
establishing new methods of membership and leadership development,
reflecting the diversity of our entire blind community. In promoting a
diverse and growing organization, we have come to expect integrity and
honesty in our relationships with each other and openness to learning about
and experiencing social, cultural, faith, and political diversity. I share
in the belief that these qualities are crucial to fostering social and
intellectual maturity. Intellectual maturity also requires individual
struggle with unfamiliar or unpopular ideas. I not only recognize but
embrace that our diverse views and convictions will and should be
challenged and expect this challenge to take place in a climate of
tolerance and mutual respect in order to maintain a united organization.
I believe that this is what makes the National Federation of the
Blind powerfully and uniquely effective and exists as a model to be
emulated throughout our society. What other entity can claim credit for
passage of monumental legislation such as the Pedestrian Enhancement Safety
Act or navigating the elaborately complex labyrinth of legal acrobatics to
see through to ratification of the Marrakesh Treaty that will allow access
to Braille materials across borders? These are just a couple of examples of
what is possible through the power of collective action.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Christina Daniels]
Submissions Open for San Francisco LightHouse's Holman Prize
by Christina Daniels
From the Editor: Improving the world for the blind is assisted by
awards that offer both recognition and money. The NFB gives several of
them, and so too do other organizations. The Holman Prize has certainly
made substantial awards to people we know as Federationists, but beyond
this, they have included a number of our members to help in the selection
process.
Christina Daniels is an officer in our San Francisco Chapter and an
active member of the California Affiliate. She works for San Francisco
LightHouse for the Blind, and one of her jobs is advertising the Holman
Prize.
For the fourth straight year, the LightHouse for the Blind in San
Francisco presents the Holman Prize for Blind Ambition. The Holman Prize is
an international competition that offers up to $25,000 each to three blind
individuals to carry out ambitious ideas that push the winners to challenge
themselves and shatter misconceptions about blindness around the world.
The Holman Prize is named after nineteenth century explorer James
Holman. Holman was a member of the Royal British Navy. In 1810, while on
duty in the Americas, he contracted an illness and became blind. He was
given a lifetime of free room and board at Windsor Castle, and the only
requirement was to attend church twice a day. Dissatisfied with this
uneventful life, Holman left to study medicine and literature at the
University of Edinburgh. He would leave again to take a grand tour of
France, Italy, Switzerland, and Germany and write his first book, The
Narrative of a Journey through France, etc. in 1822. He became the first
blind person to circumnavigate the globe in 1832. Holman would eventually
travel to six continents and continued to chronicle his travels in writing.
James Holman is the most prolific private traveler of anyone before the era
of modern transportation.
The nine winners of LightHouse for the Blind's Holman Prize so far
represent five countries across four continents. They embody the spirit of
James Holman, who was not content to conform to expectations and to live a
life that did not satisfy or challenge him. Three of the winners have been
active in the NFB:
. 2018 winner Stacy Cervenka is the founder of the Blind Travelers'
Network, an online community for blind travelers of all experience
levels. The website includes a discussion forum, reviews of different
attractions from blind users, a place where users can submit their
events, and a blog where blind travelers give advice on everything
from navigating airports to traveling with just a backpack on an
international trip. For more information, visit
blindtravelersnetwork.org.
. Conchita Hern�ndez, who also won the Holman Prize in 2018, convened
the first-ever blindness conference in Mexico led by blind people.
Conchita, who is a doctoral student, and a team of fellow blind
educators, presented topics such as daily living skills, low cost
technology, employment and more to 120 conference attendees.
Conchita's wish is for the conference to happen again, but this time
run by the people who live in Mexico.
. Dr. Mona Minkara, one of the 2019 winners, will soon be releasing her
documentary series "Planes, Trains and Canes." In the closing months
of 2019, Mona traveled to five different cities: Johannesburg, London,
Istanbul, Singapore, and Tokyo. She independently navigated the local
public transportation in each city and visited local attractions. Her
documentary series chronicles her adventures in each city.
All the Holman Prize winners have embodied the concept of blind
ambition; that is, choosing to fulfill a dream on their own terms,
regardless of the negative perceptions some have about blindness. Penny
Melville-Brown of the United Kingdom taught people to cook across six
continents; Ojok Simon of Uganda taught other blind Ugandans how to be
beekeepers; Ahmet Ustunel of the United States kayaked solo across the
Bosphorus Strait; and Red Szell of the United Kingdom completed an extreme
triathlon, culminating in summiting Am Buachaille, a 213-foot sea stack.
Mona's fellow 2019 winners, like her, are in the midst of their adventures.
Yuma Decaux of Australia is traveling the world to interview STEM
professionals and creating an online community to make astronomy more
accessible to blind people, and Alieu Jaiteh of The Gambia is bringing
blindness skills training to rural Gambians.
The Holman Prize has funded blind adventurers, athletes,
entrepreneurs and educators, and three more winners will be chosen this
year. The application period is January 15 to February 29. Applicants must
be blind and 18 years old by October 1, 2020. To apply, applicants will
need to upload a 90-second video with their pitch to YouTube and fill out
an application. The winners are picked by an international team of blind
leaders who work in a variety of backgrounds from STEM to liberal arts to
education to the nonprofit sector.
Are you a blind person with an ambitious idea? Start planning your
pitch, and apply for the Holman Prize beginning January 15. For more
information visit www.holmanprize.org.
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Trying to Get Honest with the Hope of Becoming Involved
by Katrina Wright
From the Editor: Sometimes what we carry in the Braille Monitor are
statements clearly articulating what we believe and why. Sometimes the
articles we run do not involve policy positions but reflect the challenge
we all have to explore and think about difficult issues. The author of this
article submitted it to me with the hope that it would generate discussion.
I hope that it does. Here is what she says:
I'm an educated woman who's been hovering around the periphery of the
Federation for years in places as varied as Pennsylvania, Georgia, and
Kansas. The thing that's kept me from throwing my considerable weight
behind the organization is that I've felt unable to express honestly some
of the biggest concerns about stuff going on in the blind community that
I've witnessed firsthand. This being the start of a brand new year, I've
decided to just put it all out there. If nothing else, it may get people
talking. We're at a place when more is possible than ever before; sometimes
a reality check is necessary to clear things in preparation for the next
step.
First, no person has the right to inappropriately touch, grope, or
feel any other person without invitation, particularly if both people are
blind. I have had countless experiences in work-related conditions with a
blind man where our need to move in close quarters is taken as a kind of
tacit agreement that any unsolicited touching is acceptable. Often none is
necessary, which is exactly why certain instances stand out. Although
chances to engage in "adult" behaviors may be a little harder to come by
for some blind people-when compared to the sighted population-it's
exploitative for anyone to just physically impose those needs on anyone
else. We have to get comfortable enough with exercising the right to be
frank about it to allow for meaningful suggestions and opportunities for
improvement.
Second, being a blind person with a job doesn't mean you
automatically incur some kind of elite status. I for one have often found
that those of us with jobs keep them forever, never striking out to either
explore or cultivate new opportunities for employment growth. The trend in
many cases is to just stay put, never testing one's chops but instead
becoming more and more complacent. Those who push, especially in ways that
make it easier for the ones coming after, are the real winners.
Next, those of us who have people we can rely upon for active
assistance with most things are blessed, which is why it's unfair to
undervalue the real effort it takes for those with less help to get things
done. Here too-as with the work thing-the sense is that there's almost a
kind of competition. Some of us take pride in our ability to do things
which would be virtually impossible without sighted help. If one has
consistent aid, I'd say that's wonderful. You can have that; I handle my
own business with much less involvement from others and still manage to get
a lot accomplished. I think that is the mature way to look at it. We need
to get to a point where we genuinely respect each other. Empowering
ourselves at the expense of our differences clearly marks us as a
disenfranchised group with very little hope of joining the greater
community in an irrevocable way.
I enjoy outdoor activities and have found that the best way to gain
solid access to them is through visiting camps established and maintained
for the blind. Something I encounter a lot, which constitutes a major
challenge, has to do with the fact that many of the other campers have
mental impairments in addition to blindness. This often means they require
extra help. Volunteers linked to these kinds of experiences seem to have
trouble seeing the blind as individuals. Many resent the notion that it's
essential to treat each camper in response to his or her own capabilities.
Considering the number of us who financially support camps for the blind,
there should be ways we can have a say.
I don't appreciate all the patronizing and handholding, but some may
really need it. Accordingly, I don't think there's anything wrong with
being of the opinion that sometimes it makes more sense to just serve
groups with dissimilar requirements separately. It would be no different
from separating those participating in a yoga session from those
participating in choir practice. Reasonable divisions actually offer more
chances for the many types of us that there are to live the lives we really
want.
I truly believe all entities, agencies, etc. that claim to serve the
blind must be accountable-first and foremost-to the blind. It's no more
than would be expected for any other business or applicable situation. The
pizza shop had better serve good pizza, there'd be no sense in a place
calling itself a bar if it only sold chocolate milk, and no outfit serving
the blind should have goals more concerned with looking good on the tax-
exempt paperwork than doing just that.
I'm reminded of the staff at a blindness training center I attended
some years ago refusing to post a Braille sign on the door of a laundry
room detailing what its hours of operation were. There was a large-print
notice but no Braille, not even when I volunteered to gather the intel and
create one myself. It's a complete disgrace that so many individuals,
agencies, etc. bill themselves as providers of services to the blind that
are failing utterly yet still cashing in.
I can certainly appreciate that what I'm saying here encompasses
quite a lot. Some of it might not even be germane to the Federation's
direct mission, but I'd like to get a dialogue going at the least. We all
deserve the best, from each other as well as the sighted community. No
child born blind today in America should have it nearly as hard as we do
right now. Nor should that child's life be seen-by others or himself-as a
kind of judgment or misfortune. I challenge all Federationists who read
this to think ahead; we can't lose track of the parts of ourselves that are
at the heart of the matter and thus the root of everything the Federation
will ever be.
----------
Recipes
Recipes this month were contributed by members of the National
Federation of the Blind of New Jersey.
Ruffs Puffs
by Joe Ruffalo
Joe, president of the NFBNJ since 1993, owned and operated a baking
business for seven years. Here is one of his (and many others) favorite
recipes, Ruffs Puffs. This recipe makes a dozen large cream puffs. Double
the ingredients for double the pleasure.
Ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 stick butter or margarine
4 large eggs
1 cup of water
1 box of instant pudding
1-1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup sour cream
Method: In a one-quart saucepan combine one cup water and one stick
butter. Place saucepan on low heat, bringing the water and butter to a
rolling boil. Turn off heat and add one cup flour, stirring with wooden
spoon until the mixture is thick and there are no lumps (approximately
three to five minutes). When the batter is perfect, the wooden spoon will
stand straight up in it. Place batter in a large mixing bowl. Add four
large eggs, one at a time, stirring constantly to insure that the batter
remains stiff. When all four eggs have been worked in and you are satisfied
with the stiffness of the batter, you are ready to make the Ruff's puff
shells.
You may want to grease the cookie sheets you use for baking the puffs
if they do not have a nonstick surface or are not already well seasoned.
Use a quarter-cup to measure the batter. Be sure to pack the batter into
the cup so that you have no air pockets. Smooth the surface of the batter
with the reverse side of a butter knife, allowing excess batter to fall
back into the mixing bowl. Place the batter on the cookie sheet by sliding
the butter knife around the inside of the measuring cup to loosen it. If
the resulting puff is not round, shape it with your hands. Leave one to two
inches of space around each puff.
Place sheet in preheated 375-degree oven for thirty-five to forty
minutes or until the smell of the puffs tells you that they are golden
brown. Half-way through the cooking process, rotate the cookie sheet 180
degrees to insure even baking. Be very certain that the puffs are done;
they will fall when removed from the pans if they are not thoroughly done
and a bit crisp to the touch. When done, gently remove puffs from cookie
sheet and allow cooling on a rack or plate. Do not cut puffs until they are
room temperature.
While puffs are cooling, in a large metal mixing bowl make the cream
filling. Use one package vanilla or chocolate instant pudding. Once the
instant pudding is in the mixing bowl, add one and a half cups milk, any
kind--whole milk adds a calorie or two but makes the filling noticeably
richer. Then add a half cup of sour cream. Using an electric mixer on low
speed, mix filling for approximately two minutes, then increase speed to
high for about thirty seconds. Allow to stand at room temperature for
approximately ten minutes. If you prefer to mix the cream by hand, use an
eggbeater for about three to five minutes or until the cream thickens.
Use a sharp knife to cut puffs before filling them. I cut puffs
horizontally about three-quarters of the way through, approximately in the
middle. This should expose a hollow space in the center. If not, pull out
enough of the soft center to make your own hollow for filling. Using a
tablespoon, begin filling the puffs with the cream and then close them
again. Place in the refrigerator and enjoy the cleanup. Double the recipe
and you will double the calories. Enjoy the Ruff's Puffs and watch your
waistline grow.
----------
Healthy Snack Choices
by Jerilyn Higgins
Jerilyn Higgins, a member in the NFBNJ for over thirty years, has
provided some healthy snack ideas for the upcoming BELL Academy. Joe
Ruffalo's favorite is number thirteen.
1. Fruit and cheese skewer using any fruit like grapes, watermelon,
tangerine, blueberries, and strawberries and layering it with
mozzarella string cheese cut into four chunks.
2. Homemade granola or trail mix using nuts, dried fruit, pumpkin seeds,
shredded coconut, and pretzels
3. Carrot and celery sticks with pre-made hummus or homemade ranch
dressing using yogurt
4. Peanut butter on celery or apple slices with raisins or chia seeds on
top (can even use apple slices to make a sandwich)
5. Pinwheels using small whole wheat wrap, peanut butter, bananas, and
chia seeds
6. Cucumber cups using one-inch rounds that you scoop out the flesh with
a melon baller. Fill with yogurt or tzatziki or hummus
7. Caprese skewers using grape tomatoes, mozzarella, and fresh basil
8. Fruit smoothie using yogurt, almond milk, and any kind of fruit
9. Banana chocolate ice cream using frozen bananas and cocoa powder
10. Homemade pickle chips using cucumber slices and a pre-made pickling
liquid using some honey to offset the sour
11. Yogurt parfait using fruit, granola or oats, nuts, seeds, and shredded
coconut
12. Air-popped popcorn using a brown bag in the microwave. Can top with
parmesan cheese or nutritional yeast if you want to try it
13. Watermelon pizza using triangular sliced watermelon wedges, topped
with feta and mint, or yogurt, berries, and chia seeds
14. Guacamole or hummus with whole wheat pita chips
15. Grilled chicken nuggets with a homemade honey mustard sauce using
honey, mustard, and plain fat-free yogurt
16. Pineapple cut outs using fun shaped cookie cutters
17. Melon balls with fresh mint. Kids use a melon baller to form the balls
from honeydew, cantaloupe, or watermelon (or all three!)
----------
Multi-Bean Veg Chili
by Annemarie Cooke
Annemarie Cooke is an NFBNJ state affiliate board member, vice
president of the NFBNJ Sports and Recreation Division, treasurer of the
NFBNJ technology division, and board member for the Garden State Chapter.
She adapted this recipe from Rachael Ray's Veg-Head Three Bean Chili. The
blind high school transition students here in NJ enjoy making this meatless
dish. It travels well, accommodates most dietary restrictions, and can be
spiced up or down depending on personal preference. Serves six or more
depending on portion size.
Ingredients:
1 can black beans, rinsed in colander with cold water
1 can red kidney beans, rinsed in colander with cold water
1 can white cannellini beans, rinsed in colander with cold water
1 large onion, diced
2 bell peppers, red or green
1 can vegetarian refried beans
6 cloves of fresh garlic, chopped, or use garlic powder to taste
2 fresh poblano chili peppers or a jar of pickled jalape�o peppers
1 28-ounce can crushed San Marzano tomatoes
1 can diced tomatoes
1 box vegetable stock
Extra virgin olive oil
Cumin
Chili powder
Kosher salt
Black pepper
Method: Chop bell peppers and onions into small dice; set aside.
Roast poblano chilis over open flame on stove or under broiler, turning
frequently until skin is blistered and charred. Place peppers in a small
bowl and cover with plastic wrap or a clean dish towel for about ten
minutes, then scrape char off skin, slice off top, and rinse out seeds. Dry
with paper towels and chop into small dice.
Drizzle about two or three tablespoons of the oil into a Dutch oven
or large pot. When oil is hot, add bell peppers, onions, and poblanos along
with a generous pinch of salt and pepper. Saut� about eight minutes until
soft. Add garlic. Deglaze pan with a half cup of vegetable stock, then add
crushed and diced tomatoes. Add about a tablespoon of cumin and chili
powder in the palm of your hand, then stir into vegetable mixture.
Bring to simmer and add all beans except for refried beans. Add
vegetable stock to hydrate the chili and cook for about twenty minutes.
Thicken by adding refried beans and cook another fifteen minutes.
Adjust seasoning with additional salt and pepper and hot sauce of
your choice. Serve with tortilla chips, rice, and corn bread-whatever you
like. Keeps in the freezer up to a month if frozen in an airtight
container.
----------
Healthy Green Smoothie
by Linda Melendez
Linda is a National Federation of the Blind Sports and Recreation
Division board member, NFBNJ first vice president, and president of the
NFBNJ Sports and Recreation Division.
Ingredients:
8 ounces coconut water (not sweetened cream of coconut)
4 strawberries (I prefer frozen because they make the drink colder)
1/2 of a small banana
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of each: flax, chia, and hemp seeds combined
A healthy handful of baby spinach
A few pieces of kale
Method: Blend all ingredients thoroughly into a liquid. Chill and
enjoy! Please note that too much spinach and kale will make the smoothie
too thick.
----------
Ada's Sweet Potato Special
by Ellen Sullivan
Ellen Sullivan is the affiliate secretary of the National Federation
of the Blind of New Jersey and also serves as chair of the Fundraising
Committee. Ellen joined the NFB in 2017 while she was living in Delaware,
and in 2018 she moved back to her home state of New Jersey and became a
very active member of the New Jersey Affiliate. This recipe is from a dear
blind woman in Ellen's Delaware book club.
Ingredients:
3 pounds of sweet potatoes diced (approximately four cups)
1 stick of butter
1/2 cup of maple syrup
Zest of 2 medium-size oranges and squeeze out the juice
Method: Add all ingredients to a crock pot and cook on low for four
hours. Add 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon and nutmeg at the end.
----------
Monitor Miniatures
News from the Federation Family
Elected:
The following officers were elected at the November meeting of the
National Federation of the Blind of Arizona East Valley Chapter: president,
Megan Homrighausen; first vice president, Ammar Tarin; second vice
president, Samaya Tarin; secretary, Tony Sohl; treasurer, Jennifer Kasl;
board member one, Mark Feliz and board member two, Heather Bowes.
Blind Cruising 2020:
The National Federation of the Blind of Maryland will be hosting a
cruise fundraiser from September 27 to October 4, 2020. The affiliate will
receive a portion of the cost of each cabin that is booked. All are
welcome, including members of the NFBMD, other affiliates, families,
colleagues, and friends. For additional information or to reserve your
cabin, please email NFBMD.outreach at gmail.com. Details are as follows:
Ship: Carnival Pride
Date: September 27 to October 4, 2020
Port of departure: Baltimore, Maryland
Number of nights: seven
Ports visited: Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos; Half Moon Cay, Bahamas; and
Freeport, Bahamas
Key dates:
First deposit due: January 10, 2020, $25 per person
Second deposit due: April 15, 2020, $250 per person plus full names
of sailors
Final payment due: June 15, 2020
Types and prices of cabins (this is a per person price based on
double occupancy and includes cabin fee, port charges, and taxes)
Balcony cabin (extended balcony) = $951.64 per person
Balcony cabin (standard balcony) = $928.64 per person
Balcony cabin (obstructed view) = $885.64 per person
Ocean View cabin = $835.64 per person
Interior cabin = $770.64 per person
If anyone needs a triple or quad cabin, they should let us know.
Blind Intelligence Analyst Sues FBI and Department of Justice:
Lawsuit Says FBI Technology is Inaccessible
Joe Orozco, a blind intelligence analyst with the Federal Bureau of
Investigation since 2012, is suing the FBI and the United States Department
of Justice for violating his civil rights under Section 508 of the
Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended. The lawsuit alleges that technology
Mr. Orozco is required to use in his job, some of which is proprietary, is
inaccessible to him and to other blind employees and that the FBI has
offered no alternative means for him to access the information, data, and
services available through this technology.
Like many other blind people, Mr. Orozco uses screen reader
technology. It converts digital information into synthesized speech and
uses keystrokes to execute many functions, to read and interact with
computer software, Internet and intranet websites, and mobile apps. When
not properly coded, however, these technologies can present barriers so
that screen readers cannot interpret them or access their functions.
Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act requires the FBI, like other federal
agencies, to ensure that the information technology it develops, procures,
maintains, or uses allows all federal employees, with or without
disabilities, to have access to, and use of, information and data. The
law's implementing regulations contain specific guidelines for creating and
procuring accessible technology. Mr. Orozco's lawsuit, brought with the
assistance of the National Federation of the Blind, alleges that the FBI
and Justice Department have failed to follow or deliberately ignored these
guidelines.
"It is nothing short of shameful that two of our nation's top law
enforcement agencies are flouting a federal civil rights law and failing to
value the contributions of Mr. Orozco and other blind people who are
helping to protect all Americans," said Mark Riccobono, President of the
National Federation of the Blind. "America's civil rights organization of
the blind is proud to stand up for the right of blind people to play an
equal role in our nation's security."
Mr. Orozco is represented by Timothy Elder and Albert Elia of the TRE
Legal Practice.
In Brief
Notices and information in this section may be of interest to Monitor
readers. We are not responsible for the accuracy of the information; we
have edited only for space and clarity.
Touch History, The Library of Congress' Verbal Description Tour
Visitors with visual impairment are invited to experience a walking
tour of the Thomas Jefferson Building. The Touch History tour is led by a
specially trained docent who uses vivid language and original building
materials to describe and interact with the building. Tours will be held by
advance request and last about one hour.
Please contact the visitor engagement office at VEO at loc.gov or
202-707-
9779 to secure your reservation. It is recommended that you reserve your
spot about two weeks prior to the tour date.
Groups interested in visiting should contact Cathy at
grouptours at loc.gov. If ADA accommodations are needed, please make requests
five business days in advance at 202-707-6362 or ADA at loc.gov.
----------
NFB Pledge
I pledge to participate actively in the efforts of the National
Federation of the Blind to achieve equality, opportunity, and security for
the blind; to support the policies and programs of the Federation; and to
abide by its constitution.
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