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NEWS NOTES FROM THE NATIONAL OFFICE
May 9, 2003

It is with great sorrow that we share the passing of Betty Gayzagian of Watertown Massachusetts. Betty was held in high esteem by all who knew her. She literally defined poise and grace and our hearts go out to Al and all the family who had the blessing of her being with them for so many years. May Betty rest in peace and may we all never forget who she was and in what she believed for all humankind.

This year is the twenty-ninth year of what has become known as the Institute for Rehabilitation Issues (IRI.) It is a research forum in which topics are explored with resulting papers developed to provide guidance and best thinking to workers in the field of rehabilitation.

This year, the topics were, 1) empowerment of people with disabilities in the rehab process and 2) the shortage of qualified orientation and mobility instructors with a view towards utilization of non-traditionally trained people.

ACB was very pleased with the overall thrust of the empowerment discussion which pointed towards consumers and counselors becoming real partners in the process with consumers having real choices. We did however, make the point that empowerment simply does not exist when it is indexed to some external variable such as an organization which would leave the consumer at risk whenever that external variable changed. Our example was a reliance upon a psychiatrist instead of a person being empowered irrespective of external variables. in short, full reliance upon oneself is true empowerment, versus needing a constant relationship with a person or organization to maintain one's empowerment.

The second area of study being orientation and mobility was not so esoteric. ACB representatives Penny Reeder and Kim Avilla joined with many others in expressing real concerns about the quality and content of the orientation and mobility draft paper with respect to credibility and efficacy. While it is clearly true that there is a real shortage of university trained instructors who are certified in the traditional knowledge and skill sets necessary for competent instruction, to simply declare another model as a real alternative and to attempt to legitimize it through the paper under discussion is hardly evidence of sufficient merit to warrant endorsement. We will be watching closely what evolves from those two days.

No, there are not strange plants growing on our walls, but a morning reading of an indoor thermometer purchased by Charlie Crawford read 90 degrees in sharon's work area. In fact there have been two occasions where we have had to close the national office due to either extreme heat or black smoke as the landlord is moving forward with renovations. We suspect that two computers have died and a third is at risk given the conditions under which folks have had to work.

Even with humorous relief of the speculation about making the national office the site of our swim suit edition of the Braille Forum, we have had to notify the landlord in no uncertain terms as to what we expect of him. It is our understanding that they will have installed and made operational the air conditioning for this coming Monday and so lets keep our fingers crossed that it all will work out.

this week brought an attack on the Randolph Sheppard vending priority on military bases where blind vendors have had the priority opportunity to run food services. Given the fact that the organized blind combined to defeat a legal challenge to the ability of vendors to have this priority a couple of years ago, we find now what we suspect to be a National Industries for the Severely Handicapped prompted move in Congress to weaken the law. It is gratifying to see our community uniting behind blind vendors and ACB is particularly proud of the Randolph Sheppard Vendors of America and it's commitment to fight this to the end.

there is proposed legislation called Senate 747 and as yet, another to be numbered bill in the House that would open the doors to other interests in gaining access to military base cafeteria and food service. ACB will supply more information as this story develops but it is sufficient to say that advancing the interest of other disabilities by attacking the programs of another is simply unacceptable and will be remembered and defeated.

Congratulations to Terry, Patricia, Cynthia and Carla for all the work they have done on this year's convention. Terry advises she has finished the preregistration packets and they have been sent out for a quick review before a final mailing this week. We had hoped to get them out last week, but that is the bad news; the good news is that they were delayed due to some event price lowering! Now, how often have you heard that prices were lowered? Smile.

Walks national convention! It's true! America Walks will be holding next year's convention in silver Spring Maryland. This national group and associated coalitions of pedestrian and bike groups has been most friendly to our objectives of increasing pedestrian access and safety to our communities throughout the nation. ACB Exec Director Charlie Crawford and Ped Coordinator Phil Strong attended the first organizing meeting of the local group to work on the convention and you'll be hearing much more about it!

No, not making friends with Mickey, but hey how about a braille mouse for a computer that not only provides braille, but raise images of graphics and is designed especially for blind kids and learning? It's called the Virtouch by Aaron Roth and ACB staff had an opportunity to see a demo of it this week. In fact, we are not going to hog all the fun to ourselves, but you'll get a chance to see it at the convention as well!

News notes are a compilation of the highlights of the events of the preceding week and are not intended to provide a comprehensive listing of all activities, or treatment of the topics mentioned. For information and more detailed treatment of especially legislative concerns, call the Washington Connection at 800-424-8666 nights and weekends eastern time. Be sure to read the Braille Forum each month and check in with the ACB website and ACB radio

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