[NFBofSC] Positive Note 1750

[David Houck]

February 26, 2020

Memo To:  Executive Officers, Board Members, Chapter & Division Presidents &
Others

From:  Frank Coppel, President

Positive Note 1750

Greetings Fellow Federationists:

 

              We have an announcement regarding the South Carolina
Presidential primary being held on Saturday, February 29.  P&A will be
staffing a line to field issues that disability voters have on election day.
That number will be the P&A regular Information and Referral number and will
be staffed with an intake professional.  Numbers are as follows:  Intake
Line: 1-866-275-7273, TTY:  1-866-232-4525.

             In the February 12, edition of the Positive Note I stated the
work done by us on Capitol Hill on February 11, lays the ground work for
passage of the legislative initiatives we discussed with our Congressional
delegation.  All of us need to continue to contact our Congressmen and
Senators throughout the year to encourage these individuals to cosponsor our
legislation.  To this end, I would like to share with you an email I
received from John Paré, our national Executive Director of Advocacy and
Policy.  

              Dear Federation Family:

             This year’s Washington Seminar was a great success. We had over
500 attendees from 49 states. Representative Bobby Scott, chair of the House
Committee on Education and Labor, spoke at the Great Gathering-In. Chairman
Scott is the sponsor of the Transformation to Competitive Employment Act.
Senators Ben Cardin and Bob Casey, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, and
Representative Mike Thompson all spoke at our Congressional reception.
Representative Mike Thompson is the chair of the Tax Policy Subcommittee,
and he is the sponsor of the Access Technology Affordability Act.

             We also had a substantial increase in the number of cosponsors
for each of our bills. In the House, the Access Technology Affordability Act
went from forty-nine to sixty-three cosponsors. And in the Senate, it went
from fifteen to seventeen cosponsors. The GAIN Act went from four to
thirteen cosponsors. Finally, AIM HIGH went from four to twelve cosponsors
in the House. 

              We need to keep building on the momentum generated by
Washington Seminar. Similar to what we did in the fall, we are going to
focus on our legislation one bill per week for the next several weeks. We
will begin next week by focusing on the Access Technology Affordability Act
(H.R. 2086 and S. 815).

             This legislation removes an employment barrier commonly
experienced by blind Americans who cannot afford the high cost of access
technology by creating a refundable tax credit in the amount of $2,000 to
offset the cost of these technologies.

             Please call your representative and two senators and urge them
to cosponsor the Access Technology Affordability Act if they have not
already done so. For those of you who attended Washington Seminar, you
should follow up with the staff person you met with. 

              When you call or email, you might say something like the
following:

              "Hello, my name is [your name] and I am a constituent of [your
senator/representative]. I live in [city, state]. I am calling to urge [your
senator/representative] to cosponsor [S. 815 for Senate calls/H.R. 2086 for
House calls], the Access Technology Affordability Act. This legislation
removes an employment barrier commonly experienced by blind Americans who
cannot afford the high cost of access technology by creating a refundable
tax credit in the amount of $2,000 to offset the cost of these technologies.
I urge [your senator/representative] to cosponsor the bill.  Thanks."

             You can contact your member of Congress by calling the Capitol
Switchboard and asking for the office in question. The number is
202-224-3121. 

              It is best to email the specific staff person who handles tax
policy for that member of Congress. You can typically get the name and email
address of that person by calling the office in question. You can also email
Jesa here at the NFB and she will get this information for you. Her email is
jmedders at nfb.org.   Your calls and emails do make a difference! 

              The goal is to get to 100 cosponsors in the House and 25 in
the Senate within the next few weeks. I am certain that if we all work
together we can reach this goal.

              If you have any questions, please feel free to call me at
410-659-9314, extension 2218 or email me at jpare at nfb.org. 

              Congratulations to Craig Capps as well as the Belvedere
chapter of the NFB of SC for becoming the newest members of the $100/100
club, as they each contributed $100 to the Rocky Bottom refrigerator/freezer
fund.  Thus far, we have raised $3670 in contributions and 

pledges.  

              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.  

 

Final Thought:  Transforming dreams into reality:  If people tell you it
can’t be done, sometimes it is because they were afraid to try.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://nfbnet.org/pipermail/nfbofsc_nfbnet.org/attachments/20200226/55d2e2b7/attachment.html>