[Nyagdu] End of 2013 Report from Travel & Tourism

Sat Dec 28 14:45:36 UTC 2013

Please reply all when responding to this post. 
Happy New Year to the Members, Officers and some of the Leaders with the NFB Travel & Tourism Division, a proud division of the National Federation of the Blind.
I hope next year I can do this again, if re-elected in July as President.
I also want to remind those that are reading this that we are not just a leisure travel division, we are also not for those who are travel professionals, but we will be encouraging those some ideas about working in the field, whether being a travel agent, or possibly in customer service, and other areas. As well as, advocating in congress whether it be in DC or our own states.  So. please take another look at this division.  If you don't like the topic, you got the friendly delete button, but before you delete it, look more than what the topic reads, you never know what is going on.
In 2011, I was very proud to be asked to take over the position as president by Don Gillmore, who was then president, and Milton Taylor, who has been Treasurer of the division since 2004, and had to resign a few months ago to be honored by the Lions Club International in Utah, by being nominated and now elected 2nd Vice District Governor there, being a Lion myself, this is a great honor, and Milton has stated that we wants Lions and NFB to be able to work together more, I hope I can follow in his foots steps myself with my club here in Brentwood, at least try.
Milton Taylor, has served not only the NFB for many years, including being President of that Affiliate, but has been our Treasurer for 10 years. I know this is not an easy job, holding both Treasurer and Vice President of the NFB of Greater Long Island Chapter, plus wearing other hats in our family with the NFB.
We now have a great lady, who is our Treasurer, Mrs. Glenda Farnum, from the NFB of Oklahoma, if you have not already welcomed her please do so.
This division has doubled in membership since 2012, when I was officially elected to my 2 year term, and this could not be done alone. 
We have a great group of officers, that I am proud to say, we are the best of friends as well, which is very important, we have our own opinions, but we are able to bring all of these to the table with great respect.
All of our positions are up for re-election at National Convention in Orlando, and we hope that you will re-elect us.
Introductions if you don't already know.
Vice President - Maurice Shackelford from Atlanta, GASecretary - Margo Downey from Buffalo, NYTreasurer - Glenda Farnum from Warr Acres, OKBoard Member - Amy Baron from Minneapolis, MNBoard Member - Jemal Powell from Chicago, IL
And myself President - Cheryl Echevarria from Brentwood, NY
As mentioned this division has grown a lot since 2011, since National Convention in 2013, we have not only held teleconference for our Board of Directors, but we do an "At Large" Chapter Meeting every month, these meetings will be posted, and I do hope that I can convince David Andrews to post these meetings as well, everyone, please and thank your for your very hard work that you do David. 
We are hoping that all of you who are paid and non paid members will come to the at large chapter meetings, to learn what we are doing during the year. We are actively trying to work with NAGDU and the National Office on issues that affect us in the way of all travel related issues.
All of the meeting information is up on our website, http://www.nfbtravel.org, which is updated by our webmaster Lavar Phillips from Woodside, NY, who is also a member of the division and myself.
We have a twitter page, which is https://twitter.com/travelandtouri1 and a Facebook page NFB Travel and Tourism Division, launched in April 2012, which we have people from all over the country and the world, blind and not blind that enjoy our information.
We are very proud to have brought to the NFB and to the Convention, as well as some write ups in the Braille Monitor about our trips and tours, by bringing Mark Jones, Manager of Domestic Services for Guests with Disabilities for Walt Disney Parks and Resorts from Disney Theme Parks and Resorts, first from my radio show on the Echevarria Travel Show, which is run and produced by the Northeast Chapter of the NFB of New Jersey, the same radio station that brings you Thru Our Eyes with Joe Ruffalo and my show and 2 other shows that are live and call in shows.  Mark also come on our teleconference calls to talk about concerns we had with the Disney Parks, and educated us on these issues, he also took the officers of the division to the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World prior to our meeting at convention, about the accessibility at the parks and also with our concerns with guide dogs as well.  He also not only spoke at our meeting, but he came back to speak at the NAGDU meeting.  Wonderful Man and thank you Mark for doing this.
We also had Mr. Rob Nevin, from U-R-Able to come and speak, about the software  ALT, who spoke about working in customer service with this wonderful program, to help us work even possibly faster than our sighted workers, he also donated a door prize for our meeting, which were wireless headphones.
Our other guest who also did double duty at the convention by speaking about NAGDU and Travel & Tourism was Mr. Steve Olsen from the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, spoke and urged us to let his organization know of any concerns we have while visiting zoos or aquariums, especially with our guide dogs. He was also very proud to say that Animal Kingdom in Walt Disney World was on the members of the organization. The AZA has been around since 1929 and began accrediting in the late 1970’s. AZA now has 221 members and is supported by dues.
You can find all of this information on our website, as well as, how to join the division and to pay your dues, either via paypal.com or check/money order, or wait until convention to pay in cash.
2 final things we did this year, one was to do our very 1st Fundraiser Trip Event, again this information is up on our website. We did a very successful trip to Las Vegas and Utah in October, we had 24 people with us from 9 states.  We were successful enough to make a donation to the National Challenge during meet the blind month.
We also are taking reservations now for our 2nd Annual Fundraiser Trip to Country Music USA - Nashville, which will be from Monday October 6 - Friday October 10th.  Again information up on our website for pricing and payment plans.
Well I summed it up there with the 2 together.
We hope those of you on the list, will become more active, especially those that are paid members, those that are not, we hope you will join, this division cannot thrive and survive without you the members.
Some of the things we want to do in 2014, is to possibly join with NAGDU in this Resolution and maybe bring more people to come and speak to both divisions or to combine something together.
We have a lot that needs to be done in the realm of travel, not only for us to travel independently, but also in the realm of employment, you don't have to be a travel agent to work in the travel profession.
God Bless!
Thank you and Happy New Year!
Cheryl Echevarria, PresidentNFB Travel & Tourism631-236-5138cherylandmaxx at hotmail.cominfo@nfbtravel.org

Disabled Entrepreneur of the Year 2012 of NY StateOffering the Best in Meaningful Travel Experiences for Everyone!Cheryl Echevarria, Ownerwww.echevarriatravel.com631-456-5394reservations at echevarriatravel.com

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