DEAF WATCH----APRIL 1999 Greetings! Two years ago, Californians with hearing disabilities have been fooled by Ron Rhodes, into trusting him to lead the California Association of the Deaf (CAD). Two years later, where are we? What happened to CAD? Under the leadership of Ron Rhodes, the California Association of the Deaf has been reduced to next to non-existent. This stagnating drift toward the bottom must end today, and it is time I do something about it and the only way to do this is to take the organization by the reins. Yesterday, I officially declared my candidacy as the next president of the California Association of the Deaf. Website at Http://www.i-sphere.com/eyedeaf/cad99.htm to inform the public of my candidacy. Richard Roehm ************************************************************* MAJOR CHANGES IN THE 'SPECIAL BULLETIN' SYSTEM We have been testing a new version of our fabled 'Special Bulletin' system. Rather than send many batches of email each time, we have created a webpage for the bulletins and it is updated several times a day and already being used. We are pleased with the results. After entering www.deafwatch.com in your browser, you will come to the maingate page and you will see a "CLICK HERE FOR" then "THE VERY LATEST" then "NEWS - ALERT!" graphic and clicking on that graphic will bring you to the special bulletin page with information and action suggestions for visitors to take. Information contained will be the latest pertaining to that particular urgency. ************************************************************* UNION SUMMER 1999 SEEKS PAID INTERNS Today's unions are making a difference on the issues you care about - discrimination, poverty, and injustice. Together in unions, working people from all walks of life are improving their lives and achieving real change. This summer, you can join them in the fight for economic and social justice. Spend four intense weeks alongside workers, students and other activists in organizing for workplace rights and fairness. Union Summer is seeking people who are committed to social and economic justice and who can work well in a diverse group. Applicants must be 18 or older. Interns are paid a stipend of $210/week(taxable). Housing and transportation on site is provided. There will be sites nationwide. Interns are responsible for getting themselves to and from the site. If you would like more information or would like to apply, either visit our web site at www.unionsmr.org, e-mail unionsmr@aol.com, or call 800-952-2550 (DC call 639-6220). ************************************************************* BUSINESS TAX INCENTIVES FOR ACCESS TO THE DISABLED If you own or operate a business, you should be aware of two tax incentives for helping persons with disabilities. They are: -Deduction for costs of removing architectural or transportation barriers. This is a deduction you can take for making your facility or public transportation vehicle more accessible to and usable by persons who are disabled or elderly. See chapter 11 in Publication 535, Business Expenses. -Disabled Access Credit. This is a tax credit for an eligible small business that pays or incurs expenses to provide access to persons with disabilities. The expenses must be paid or incurred to enable the eligible small business to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. See the instructions for Form 8826, Disabled Access Credit, for more information. ************************************************************* DEAF WATCH NEWSLETTER ISSUES YEAR 2000 READINESS STATEMENT We are fully aware of the complications and threats of difficulties the so called 'Year 2000 Bug' will bring upon the globe. We have taken steps to ensure all of our internet providers are compliant as of today and have begun reducing our dependence on time sensitive software and we are now testing several temporary fixes for the bug. We are placing a heavy emphasis on reducing our dependence on time sensitive software and increasing our access to atomic clock servers. We should be fully prepared by May 1, 1999. We encourage everyone to check our 'Year 2000 Bug' page. ************************************************************* SAN DIEGO MESA COLLEGE HIKES INTERPRETER PAY TO REMEDY SHORTAGE Jeff Ristine STAFF WRITER The one thing San Diego Mesa College student Tamra Haarsager needs most for her education is often in the shortest supply: interpreters for the deaf. Haarsager, 31, depends on sign language to understand lessons in the history and math courses she is taking. If a course doesn't offer an interpreter, she said, "there's no way I can take it unless the teacher signs." It is this kind of imperative that led the San Diego Community College District, in what was described as an emergency measure, to boost hourly pay for interpreters by up to 42 percent. Lynn C. Neault, assistant chancellor for student services, said the district was meeting only 50 to 60 hours of the 100-hours-a-day demand for interpreters' services. One reason: The district's pay scale had fallen far behind that of other educational institutions in the county. The new scales, approved last week by the district's board of trustees, place it among the highest-paying institutions. "We know of interpreters that we've hired hourly that have called in sick to take better-paying jobs for the day," Neault said. "This is an emergency measure to see if we can curb the supply problem." The San Diego district, which includes City and Miramar colleges, has more deaf and hard-of-hearing students than San Diego State University, UC San Diego and other community college districts in the county. Each year about 150 of its students rely on sign-language interpreters. They include many adults in continuing education programs and others in challenging classes such as languages and chemistry. The new pay scale offers $15 an hour for entry-level interpreters, up from $10.50, and $25 for top-level positions, up from $18. The rates go into effect next month. The district has nine contract positions for interpreters, with four vacancies. The district books interpreters from private-sector agencies to fill some of its needs, but they can cost up to $35 an hour. Haarsager said the interpreters, whom she also has used in English, health education and other classes, do more than just make the instructor understandable. "I am able to participate (in class)," she said. "If I am not sure what the teacher meant, or need clarification, I can ask." Haarsager, who hopes to transfer to UCSD for its teaching program, said she has never been forced to drop a class for the lack of an interpreter, but she knows of other deaf students who have. Neault said the district sometimes can offer note-taking or closed-captioning when interpreters are not available, but students generally are not happy with such alternatives. "They feel almost betrayed by us," she said. From USA-L News ************************************************************* DEAF STUDENTS PROTEST INTERPRETER SHORTAGE By SOLOMON MOORE, Times Staff Writer NORTHRIDGE--When Jessica Guarino learned about Cal State Northridge and its famed National Center on Deafness, she knew it was the place for her.      As the only deaf student in her New Orleans high school, she longed for an environment where she could meet other deaf students and live where her needs would be understood. She got her camaraderie at CSUN, but it has come at a price.      "I graduated [high school] with a 3.6 grade point average," she said, signing through an interpreter. "But last semester I made a 2.5 because I couldn't get an interpreter that I could understand."      Frustrated over long delays, rigid schedules and poorly trained interpreters, Guarino and about 80 other deaf and hard-of-hearing students protested the shortage of sign-language interpreters Friday afternoon on the main quadrangle.      One by one, students stood on a bench and described humiliations, missed opportunities and dashed expectations.      "I came here from Colorado because I heard about all these great interpreters they had," said Trudy Marie Sluyter, 23, a liberal studies major. "I had an interpreter for two years, and then the third year my interpreter was gone and I just sat there in math for months. They wanted me to go to a different class with all deaf students--that meant I couldn't follow my own schedule."      As a result, Sluyter said, she will graduate a semester late.      Damion Brown, 25, arrived at CSUN last month from Boston with the expectation that he would have no problem finding an interpreter to help him through his finance classes. After three weeks, he's still on the waiting list, he said.      Some complained about sign-language interpreters who abandoned students if they were late to class. Others complained of interpreters who were late.      Herb Larson, who will retire next month from his position as director of the National Center on Deafness, said he understood the students' frustration, but was unable to offer a quick solution.      "Absolutely there's a shortage," he said. "But it's not just us here facing this problem. This is affecting all post-secondary programs--there's just not enough interpreters going through interpreter-training programs.      "It's not a budget problem," he added. "Money isn't an issue."      Larson said 256 deaf and hard-of-hearing students attend CSUN, but that the center only employs about 100 interpreters--about 90% of whom work part time. In all, interpreters are needed at 424 classes.      Interpreters are paid between $10.84 and $29.93 an hour, plus benefits.      Students complained that interpreters, who need to be highly skilled to translate academic subjects, should be paid more and given full-time jobs more often to encourage them to stay. Larson said wages and hiring practices were out of his control and were a labor matter to be negotiated by the Cal State system and its unions.      Still, some students said they felt duped by the much-touted National Center on Deafness, noting that recruitment materials sent out by the center do not mention the shortages.      Said 25-year-old April Edwards, a recent CSUN graduate, who used the center's services: "They have a reputation that they don't live up to." ************************************************************* RESOURCE OF THE MONTH: Bored at home, tired of incompetent Deaf recreational clubs? Need some fun? Here in Texas, there is a club called Stone Deaf Club and they establish large outdoor parties both day and overnight. This is a very good club and their party attendance ballparks at 10,000 people. Stone Deaf Club Website http://www.angelfire.com/tx2/stonedeaf/ ************************************************************* Disability Lawsuit News. "High Court Weighs Conflict in 2 Disability Laws By LINDA GREENHOUSE WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court on Wednesday examined the complex and at times conflicting relationship between two federal laws dealing with disabilities that limit people's opportunities to earn a living. Under the Social Security Act, people who are totally disabled receive benefits to replace lost income. Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, employers are obliged to offer the "reasonable accommodations" necessary to enable people with disabilities to stay on the job. Failure to make such an accommodation for a "qualified" person -- someone who could benefit from it -- amounts to illegal discrimination. The question for the Court Wednesday was whether someone who has applied for, or received, Social Security disability benefits essentially forfeits the right to sue an employer for disability discrimination. The case before the Justices challenged a ruling in which the federal appeals court in New Orleans established a strong legal presumption that a person who was disabled for Social Security purposes could not also be "qualified" to work, even with appropriate modifications, under the disability act. Only "under some limited and highly unusual set of circumstances" could such a person pursue a discrimination case, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said. The 1997 decision upheld a summary judgment for the employer of a woman who suffered a stroke and who tried after several months to return to her job, conducting telephone background checks of prospective employees. She was having difficulty with speech and requested several on-the-job accommodations. The employer refused and discharged her. Before she had returned to work, the woman, Carolyn Cleveland, had applied for Social Security disability benefits, certifying on a standard form that she was totally disabled and unable to work. She withdrew the application after her doctor cleared her to return to work, resubmitting it after she lost her job. At the same time, she sued her employer, Policy Management Systems Corp., for disability discrimination. The 5th Circuit's approach to the case, Cleveland v. Policy Management Systems, No. 97-1008, alarmed both the federal government and disability rights advocates, who said it threatened to strip the millions of adults who receive Social Security disability benefits of legal protections against discrimination if and when they are able to return to work. During the argument Wednesday, in which the Clinton administration argued on Ms. Cleveland's behalf, the justices appeared to agree with the company's lawyer that a person should not be able to have the benefit of two conflicting positions, claiming both disability and entitlement to work. But they also appeared troubled by the appeals court's approach, with several expressing the view that fraudulent cases could rather easily be weeded out without the need to construct novel and substantial legal obstacles in the path of most people who are trying to return to the workplace after a period of disability. "Maybe the taxpayers ought to be vindicated here," Justice Sandra Day O'Connor told the employer's lawyer, Stephen G. Morrison. "Just get her off the disability rolls and back to work." Matthew D. Roberts, an assistant solicitor general arguing for Ms. Cleveland, said that because the concept of disability meant different things under the two laws, the laws were not mutually exclusive and it was not as illogical as it might appear for a person to turn to both of them. In making a disability determination, Roberts said, the Social Security Administration does not take into account whether the person would be able to work if the employer offered particular accommodations. Such "fact-intensive" considerations were impractical in a system that handles 2.5 million cases a year -- 10 times as many, he pointed out, as are handled by the entire federal judicial system. Justice Antonin Scalia responded that it was "extraordinary that we have a law here that requires employers to make accommodations, and yet your agency is giving away money to people who are entitled to those accommodations and so are presumably employable." Pressed by the Court, Morrison, the company's lawyer, said he did not defend the "very high rhetoric" by which the 5th Circuit had appeared to bar most discrimination suits by people in Ms. Cleveland's position. But he said the appeals court had taken the right approach, to give discrimination plaintiffs the burden of explaining how they could have signed a sworn statement of total disability and then sued for the right to work." ************************************************************* Letters from readers. In doing some research I ran across your website and thought I would pass on some information that might be of interest to your readers. The Wisconsin Public Service Commission has recently proposed a variety of changes to the Universal Service rules. Among these changes is the requirement that "announcements for vacant, changed, suspended and disconnected numbers" must be played in "TTY-readable format." The proposed order goes to public hearing on April 6th and is supposed to take effect before the end of 1999. Additionally, a number of other state public service commissions have requested the info from Wisconsin for their own evaluation. If you have any questions about this, I would happily do my best to answer them. Scott Stephenson - Director of Marketing Electronic Tele-Communications, Inc. 1915 MacArthur Road - Waukesha, Wisconsin 53188 (414) 542-5600 ext 294 - fax (414) 542-1524 - email scotts@etcia.com ---- A MESSAGE TO THE DEAF "ISOLATIONIST" SECTION OF THE DEAF COMMUNITY... A recent article from BBC news in London, England, said the following: 1.) More than 7 out of 10 deaf and hard of hearing people say they feel isolated because of their hearing loss. 2.) More than 1/3 avoid meeting new (hearing) people. 3.) Almost half (46%) say that they have given up trying to explain to hearing people how to make communication easier. 4.) 91% admitted that they have difficulty coping in general society. 5.) 59% believe that hearing people think they are stupid. 6.) 1 in 5 deaf people say that they have experienced abusive language or abusive gestures (not only from hearing people -- this includes abuse from other deaf people, too). 7.) 1 in 6 deaf people avoid going to their hearing MD family doctor, because of "communication problems." 8.) More than 1 in 5 (23%) said they had left a doctor's appointment unsure of what was wrong with them. 9.) 1 in 6 of the deaf and hard of hearing also said they had trouble arranging a doctor's appointment. Complaints about doctors: * Doctors did not look at the deaf patient when talking to them. * Doctors refusing to write things down. * In some cases, the doctors flatly refused to accept that the patient was really deaf! The article found out that deaf people are staying at home, rather than going to doctors, and also that they don't want to interact otherwise with general society. A survey, though, found that 87% of the hearing doctors thought that they could communicate effectively with their deaf and hard of hearing patients. NOW, WHAT IS GOING ON? ** WHO is making the deaf community afraid of the hearing world? ** WHO is convincing deaf people to avoid meeting new hearing people? ** WHO is telling the deaf community to "give up" when communication is difficult, instead of trying to find a solution? ** WHO is telling the deaf community that "hearing people think you are stupid"? ** WHO is abusing the deaf community members NOW, and trying to get deaf people to avoid the hearing world and general society? ** WHO is trying to restrict the independence of deaf people? CERTAINLY NOT THE HEARING WORLD, NOT ANYMORE! ** The Hearing World has passed laws that advocate for the FREEDOM AND INDEPENDENCE of deaf people, as individuals, in many countries of the world. And the law in the USA is the strongest of all. ** The Hearing World has invested millions of dollars of taxpayer funds into Rehabilitation money to get deaf students higher education, paid for BY HEARING PEOPLE. And, the Hearing World has given more taxpayer dollars, and private funding, to make sure that deaf people now have ALL proper communication services in schools, colleges, universities, and in private business settings, and many other locations. ** The Hearing World is using many millions MORE of taxpayer dollars to give deaf people a basic government subsidy, so a deaf person never needs to go totally hungry, or be homeless. They don't even give that to poor hearing people! ** The Hearing World is using many more millions of dollars for improvements in technology for hearing aids and CIs; for taxpayer-funded 24 hour relay services; for free TDDs for any deaf person; for interpreter and transliterator training programs; for both regular and special schools for the deaf; for closed-captioning of television and videotapes (and now, movies); for hiring of MANY deaf actors and actresses in hearing films, plays, and television programs; for hiring of MANY deaf employees in hearing companies; and for the development of new and innovative technologies that are going to be provided in the future. SO, I ASK YOU ALL AGAIN... WHO IS TELLING THE DEAF COMMUNITY THAT THE HEARING WORLD THINKS "THE DEAF ARE STUPID?" WHO IS REALLY REJECTING WHO, AND WHY? If you still doubt that the Hearing World accepts you, then read the attached message, below. These are only two examples of the MANY sections in books, magazines, printed and electronic media, that are encouraging ACCEPTANCE of the deaf community, WRITTEN BY HEARING PEOPLE! Now, take a REALLY GOOD LOOK at your own deaf community. Times have changed in the general world, but are your own deaf community members living in the present, and looking toward the future... or are they still living in the past? And are YOU believing that the Hearing World won't accept you, and isolating yourself for no good reason? If you feel isolated TODAY, it may be your own fault. So, think very hard... WHO CONVINCED YOU, AND OTHER DEAF PEOPLE, THAT THE HEARING WORLD "THINKS YOU ARE STUPID," AND WHO REALLY CONVINCED YOU THAT YOU NEED TO ISOLATE YOURSELF FROM HEARING PEOPLE? It certainly is NOT the Hearing World that is doing that! Not now, and definitely NOT in the future. Now, some hearing people might need a little bit of training or encouragement, or a little bit of information, but is that so difficult for you to do? Hearing people DO respect you, and they MUST respect you under Federal law. Think hard... are you giving Hearing people the same respect that you expect from them? Now, read the message below... and think REALLY HARD about this... and decide what you want to do in the future, and what will make you a fully independent individual, instead of someone who may be living in unreasonable fear of something that DOES NOT ACTUALLY EXIST. Frankly, if you WANT to be isolated from hearing people, and the Hearing World, that is absolutely fine. No problem! Just be honest enough not to take the Hearing World's money or services that are intended to help you in general society. If you want to "isolate" yourself, then BE HONEST ABOUT IT -- Give up your SSI and SSDI money; buy your OWN TDD; don't use relay service (you don't need it if you want to only interact with other deaf people, in your own "subculture"); give up captioning (that gives you access to the "Hearing World," too); don't apply for Rehabilitation money; don't accept Communication Assistants that are paid for with "Hearing World" money; and... PRACTICE WHAT YOU PREACH. And, if that is "too difficult" for you, then think hard before you tell other deaf people "not to interact" with the Hearing World! Paulette Caswell ------------------------------------------------------------- - DEAF WATCH - Federal ID Number : 33-0765412 - Chief Editor/Editor : Richard Roehm - Orange County, California - Internet : Deaf@activist.com - DEAF WATCH Http://www.deafwatch.com ---------------------------------------------------------- - Education is the best gift that lasts a lifetime! - Help someone subscribe to The Deaf Watch Newsletter ---------------------------------------------------------- - SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION - To be added to the mailing list, send "SUBSCRIBE" - To be deleted from the mailing list send "DELETE" - to this address NESMUTH@HWSYS.COM - - Mailing lists are not sold/given to anyone. ------------------------------------------------------------- - Need to stay on the net? Try DeafWatch's own - "Keeping You Connected" sublink which is packed - with graphical links to FREE email providers. -------------------------------------------------------------