[Ohio-talk] NAC Article Please Read

[Eric Duffy]

 <http://www.tbo.com/storyimage/TB/20160115/ARTICLE/160119524/AR/0/AR-160119524.jpg>The National Accreditation Council for Blind and Low Vision Service's standards are "substandard" according to advocates. nacblvs.org
By Mike Salinero | Tribune Staff <mailto:MSalinero at tampatrib.com>  <https://plus.google.com/114325186261630724642?rel=author>Published: January 15, 2016

TAMPA — When one of Florida’s leading advocacy organizations for the blind meets in Tampa this weekend, the group’s long-standing feud with an accreditation agency will again surface as a source of contention.



The National Federation of the Blind, the country’s oldest and largest U.S. organization led by blind people, has been warring for decades with the National Accreditation Council for Blind and Low Vision Services. 



NFB officials say the accreditation council has low standards and approves just about any organization touting services to blind people as long as the council gets paid its fees.



The hard feelings are sure to be rekindled today when the NFB’s Florida division kicks off its four-day convention at the Tampa Doubletree Hotel, 4500 W. Cypress St. 



Florida NFB member Marion Gwizdala said he will offer a resolution demanding the state Division of Blind Services drop its requirement that agencies serving blind people first get accreditation from the National Accreditation Council.



Florida is the only state that requires the council’s accreditation, Gwizdala said.



“If they don’t get accredited, they don’t get a contract with the Division of Blind Services,” Gwizdala said. “There is nothing NAC does that is not done by some other agency.”



For years, NFB leaders have accused the accreditation council of failing to seek feedback from consumers of blind services in its review processes.



“They have a really poor record and no involvement from blind people themselves,” said Mark Riccobono, president of the National Federation of the Blind. “If you’re going to have a quality assurance seal of approval dealing with services for blind people, it should have substantive involvement from leaders representing the blind on the accreditation council.”



Bill Robinson, the accreditation council’s executive director, denied the charge, saying five of the council’s board members are blind and three have severe vision loss. 



Robinson was nearly blinded by a shotgun blast in a hunting accident and has limited vision now. He said after the accident he was fired from his job as a chief financial officer at National Linen Services.



“I understand better than anybody consumer issues,” Robinson said. “I lost my job because of being blind.”



The requirement that Florida blind and low vision agencies get approval from the National Accreditation Council is an edict handed down by the state’s Division of Blind Services, an agency within the larger Department of Education. The state agency provides money for services to blind and visually impaired people.



A spokesman for the education department said in an email that the Division of Blind Services has required accreditation from the council for more than 25 years. However, the division is evaluating what accreditation standards should be used in future contracts, education department spokeswoman Cheryl Etters said.



“The Division would be happy to have a discussion with NFB about future credentialing standards for contracting agencies serving the blind,” Etters said.



The dispute between the two organizations has been ongoing since 1971 when then-NFB President Kenneth Jernigan, in a speech at the federation’s national convention, delivered an unflattering history of the accreditation council. 



Jernigan painted the council as a rigid bureaucracy whose layers were laden with well-meaning but clueless people. More important, many of those people were not blind, he said.



The accreditation council was the successor to the Commission on Standards and Accreditation on Services for the Blind, founded in the 1960s. The American Foundation for the Blind, another advocacy group, was an early financial supporter of what Jernigan called the “seal of good practices” movement and the foundation filled many, if not most, of the accreditation council’s board.



“Although individual blind persons who were agency officials were involved in the establishment and development of COMSTAC, the blind as a group were not consulted,” Jernigan said in the speech. 



Jernigan was asked to serve on the accreditation council board, which has more than 30 members. He accepted the post, while describing the offer as tokenism because the board was not representative of the broader spectrum of blind advocacy groups.



“It is as if General Motors, Chrysler, Ford and American Motors should set up a council and put six or seven officials from each of their companies on its board and then ask the United Auto Workers to contribute a single representative,” Jernigan said.



The American Foundation for the Blind once funded nearly half the accreditation council’s budget, but has since dropped its support. Ten years ago, the foundation recommended that the accreditation council dissolve itself because few agencies around the country were seeking accreditation, said Carl Augusto, president of the American Foundation for the Blind.



“However, in Florida — a state in which most agencies are accredited — accreditation may be working more effectively,” Augusto said in an email. “The purpose of accreditation is to raise the overall quality of services among organizations nationally. Accreditation doesn’t work if few organizations seek it.”



With the loss of support from the American Foundation for the Blind, the accreditation council became a much leaner organization. Total revenues in fiscal 2014 were $93,528, according to the agency’s 2014 Internal Revenue Service 990 filing. The only paid member, according to the 990 filing, is Robinson, who was paid $36,000 in 2014.



The accreditation council uses volunteers to conduct peer reviews of agencies helping the blind. Robinson said the review teams consist of “professional people in the blind and low vision field.” The agencies being reviewed have to pay for travel, lodging and food for the peer review team. There is an also an initial application fee and then yearly fees to remain accredited. 



Robinson said rehashing the long history of enmity between the NFB and the accreditation council is not his focus and is not helpful to the aspirations of blind people. 



“It’s time to get behind blind and low vision services and support not only the National Accreditation Council but other organizations as well in trying to get help to blind consumers and get them the best services they can get,” he said.




msalinero at tampatrib.com



(813) 259-8303



Twitter: @mikesaltbo