[Ohio-talk] Refreshable Braille NFB Resolution

[David B Andrews]

I think you are overly pessimistic.  I could be wrong, but I think five 
or six years.


Dave




On 9/13/2017 10:30 AM, Marianne Denning via Ohio-Talk wrote:
> I definitely think it is a great proposal. Sadly, it will probably be
> another 15 or 20 years before NLS provides Braille displays. Sadly, that is
> our government at work.
>
> On Wed, Sep 13, 2017 at 11:05 AM, Paul Dressell via Ohio-Talk <
> ohio-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>
>> This is a good resolution; what do you think?
>> Paul
>> Regarding the Distribution of Refreshable Braille Displays to Patrons of
>> the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped
>>
>> WHEREAS, there are currently 119,487 libraries of all types operating in
>> the United States, and of these only the National Library Service for the
>> Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS) is specifically tasked with
>> distributing Braille books across the nation; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, the distribution of these Braille books by the NLS and a network
>> of cooperating regional libraries primarily occurs through the mailing of
>> hard-copy offerings, but new, low-cost devices (known as refreshable
>> Braille displays) can produce electronic Braille, saving money, saving
>> paper, and using a small electronic device instead of multiple and large
>> volumes for just one book; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, in April of 2016 the Government Accountability Office (GAO)
>> recognized the potential that refreshable Braille displays offer to
>> increase the availability of Braille materials to NLS patrons, while
>> simultaneously saving the NLS approximately ten million dollars annually;
>> and
>>
>> WHEREAS, in July of 2016 Congress affirmed the GAO’s findings by amending
>> the Pratt-Smoot Act, (2 U.S.C § 135a), to allow the NLS to “provide books
>> published either in raised characters, on sound-reproduction recordings, or
>> in any other form,” thereby opening the door for the NLS to distribute
>> refreshable Braille displays: Now, therefore,
>>
>> BE IT RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention
>> assembled this fourteenth day of July, 2017, in the city of Orlando,
>> Florida, that this organization call upon the United States Congress to
>> authorize a one-time appropriation of five million dollars to the National
>> Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, which will enable
>> the NLS, through the bidding process, to purchase a minimum of ten thousand
>> low-cost refreshable Braille displays, jumpstarting the distribution of
>> these devices to the 11 percent of NLS patrons who are already accessing
>> the library’s electronic Braille files and increasing access to refreshable
>> Braille.