[Nfbofnc] Fwd: [Nfbnet-members-list] RESOLUTION 2011-17 Regarding the Workforce Investment Act Reauthorization

[Tim Jones]

fyi.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Freeh, Jessica <JFreeh at nfb.org>
Date: Thu, Jul 7, 2011 at 1:50 PM
Subject: [Nfbnet-members-list] RESOLUTION 2011-17 Regarding the Workforce
Investment Act Reauthorization
To: nfbnet-members-list at nfbnet.org
Cc: nfb-announce at nfbnet.org


RESOLUTION 2011-17
Regarding the Workforce Investment Act Reauthorization
Proponent:

       WHEREAS, the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and
Pensions has distributed language for the reauthorization of the Workforce
Investment Act including a proposed Section 511 of Title V (the
Rehabilitation Act), which would provide for employment of people with
significant disabilities at wages below the federally mandated minimum wage;
and

       WHEREAS, the proposed language of Section 511 would be a tacit
endorsement of the subminimum wage provision found in Section 14(c) of the
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and its antiquated contention that people
with disabilities cannot be competitively employed; and

       WHEREAS, this language links the Rehabilitation Act, which was
established to assist people with disabilities in obtaining competitive
integrated employment, with Section 14(c) of the FLSA, which is based on the
false premise that people with disabilities can not be competitively
employed and therefore can be paid subminimum wages; and

       WHEREAS, the language in Section 511 that defines what steps a
vocational rehabilitation counselor must take before steering a client into
subminimum-wage employment is intended to prevent youth with disabilities
from being tracked into subminimum-wage jobs, but is likely instead to track
clients into subminimum-wage employment; and

       WHEREAS, language in Section 511 asserts that employers holding a
certificate that allows them to pay subminimum wages can also serve as
training facilities for people with disabilities, a claim that ignores the
fact that job training services provided by an employer holding a special
wage certificate are likely to reinforce the low expectation that workers
with disabilities cannot be competitively employed, since the incentive is
for the employer to continue exploiting their labor rather than prepare
workers for other employment; and

       WHEREAS, the Section 511 documentation and review process, which is
meant to provide safeguards against inappropriate use of subminimum-wage
employment, does not take into consideration the fact that state Vocational
Rehabilitation programs do not have the resources to ensure effective
compliance with the various documentation and review requirements, including
the six-month review period in the proposed language, creating an
opportunity to expand the exploitation caused by Section 14(c) of the FLSA;
and

       WHEREAS, the good intentions motivating the development of Section
511 are likely to result in enormous negative consequences, especially the
validation of subminimum-wage employment as a viable outcome for people with
disabilities; and

       WHEREAS, the language does not provide an effective procedure for
workers to challenge improper placement in such employment: Now, therefore,

       BE IT RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention
assembled this seventh day of July, 2011, in the city of Orlando, Florida,
that this organization call on members of the Senate Committee on Health,
Education, Labor, and Pensions to remove Section 511 of the proposed
Rehabilitation Act; and

       BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that we call upon all members of Congress, not
to address the unjust law of Section 14(c) with ineffective measures, but to
take direct action to abolish the reprehensible practice of subminimum-wage
employment forever.

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-- 
Tim Jones
North Carolina Food Service
Fort Bragg, NC
Office:  910-396-2297
Cell:  704-491-1486