

	THE BLIND CALIFORNIAN



	Quarterly Magazine of the 

	CALIFORNIA COUNCIL OF THE BLIND



Fall, 1999, Volume 43, No. 4



	Published in Braille, Cassette, Diskette, and Large Print 




	Catherine Skivers, President 
	836 Resota Street 
	Hayward, CA 94545
	510-357-1986 Res.


	Executive Office:
	578 B Street
	Hayward, CA 94541
	800-221-6359
	510-537-7877
	Fax: 510-537-7830




	Los Angeles Area Office, John Lopez 
	3925 East 6th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90023 
	323-268-4526


	Sacramento Area Office, Dan Kysor
	2657 Truxel Road, No. 41
	Sacramento, CA 95833
	916-648-3936
	Fax 916-929-8370
	E-mail dankysor@jps.net 


Please send all address changes to the Executive Office in Hayward. 




	Editor: Winifred Downing
	1587 38th Avenue
	San Francisco, CA 94122
	415-564-5798
	E-mail wdowning@primenet.com




Call the CALIFORNIA CONNECTION at 800-221-6359 for an update on legislation and CCB events Monday through Friday after 4 p.m. and all day on weekends.  At these times it is available also in Spanish.



Nonmembers are requested and members are invited to pay a yearly subscription fee of $10 toward the printing of THE BLIND CALIFORNIAN. 





If you or a friend would like to remember the California Council of the Blind in your will, you can do so by employing the following language: 

"I give, devise, and bequeath unto the California Council of the Blind, a nonprofit charitable organization in California, the sum of $---- (or
'----') to be used for its worthy purposes on behalf of blind persons."

If your wishes are more complex, you may have your attorney  communicate with the Hayward office for other suggested forms. Thank you.



	TABLE OF CONTENTS

From the Editor, by Winifred Downing	1

Report on the ACB Convention, by Catherine
	Skivers 	 1

Career Connections, by Catherine Schmitt 	5

A Message from Guide Dogs for the Blind, 
	by Debra Barnes 	6

The New Killing Fields: America's Intersections,
	by Charles Crawford 	7

Technology Replacing Braille, submitted by 
	Mitch Pomerantz	9

Out of the Doghouse, by Melita Waters 	13

California Council Announces Agreement with 
	Major California Bank 	14

Bias Against Persons with Disabilities in the
	Legal Profession, by Ralph Black 	15

SCVB Member Receives National Award,
	by Bernice Kandarian 	17

ACB Convention Resolutions, by Jeff Thom 	18

Bulletin Board, by Keith Black 	20

Knowledge or Control, by Betsy Winnick 	22

Federal Legislation, by Ahmad Rahman 	24

Eight  Ways to Read, by Keith Black 	25

Program Fosters Student Independence, 
	submitted by Dan Kysor 	26

Barcing up the Right Tree, Part 2, by 
	Dan Kysor 	27

In Memoriam: Cherrie Handy, by Mitch
	Pomerantz 	29

Vote on the Unified Braille Code Scheduled,
	submitted by Christopher Gray 	30

Techtalk: Information Means Power: Accessing California
	Legislation on Your Computer, by Dan Kysor 	32


The History of Orientation and Mobility 	33

Report of the Scholarship Committee, by Al Biegler 	36

A Sharing of Ideas, by Jeff Thom 	38

Around the State 	39

CCB Officers 	40

CCB Board of Directors 	40

CCB PUblications Committee 	40


In accepting material for The Blind Californian, priority will be given to articles concerning the activities and policies of the California Council of the Blind and to the experiences and concerns of blind persons.  Recommended length is under 3 pages; if space constraints make it necessary to divide an article, every effort will b made to discuss the matter with the author before publication.   


	------------
	FROM THE EDITOR

	by Winifred Downing

	After returning from the ACB convention, I had a quiet summer, using most of the days in an all-out concentration on learning Windows and Word '97.  I found some fairly adequate tutorials in braille and on cassette and inched through them laboriously hour after hour.  There were many times when I seriously considered tossing the computer with all its "advanced" programs right through the window, but then there was also the day when I copied to the clipboard a part of an e-mail message from one person and pasted it into a communication to someone else.  The sense of victory was similar to that of the child who first succeeds in pedaling a two-wheeler.  I had to call a couple of friends to rejoice.
	The really humbling part of this whole experience is the knowledge that my grandchildren can, in less than an hour, learn what it takes me days to conquer just because they can push that miserable little mouse around.  "Mouse" and "click", in fact, provoke the kind of revulsion for me that a nasty vulgarism would.  I was amused that one of the writers of one of my tutorials had received  an award because he had constructed the tool without using those two hated words even once.  
	Now it is September with  all the organizations meeting again, plans for attending the fall CCB convention, and returning to the senior institute that I enjoy very much.  Time, too, to send off this issue of The Blind Californian so that you will have copies well in advance of the convention.  
	Please remember that the deadline for the next issue is December 1.  Realizing how busy everyone is by that time, I urge you who have articles to submit to prepare and send them well ahead of time. 




	REPORT ON THE ACB CONVENTION

	by Catherine Skivers

	The 38th annual convention of the American Council of the Blind was held at the Westin and Marriott hotels in Los Angeles from July 3-9, 1999.  California was the host affiliate, and as CCB's president, I was your delegate with Charles Nabarrete as the alternate.  We attended all general sessions and as many special interest groups and committee meetings as we could.  The convention was filled with programs from morning till night and there was far too much happening to render a complete report.  Highlights will be presented here, and other members who attended the convention will submit reports on their activities.   
	Many CCB members did an outstanding job in contributing to the success of the convention.  Obbie Schoeman assisted with exhibits; Rick Plath and Rex Ransom made arrangements for the clergy and Rick also worked on guided tours;  Jerry Arakawa took charge of getting people to entertain before general session and during hospitality; Jeff Thom helped coordinate the information desk; Win Downing worked with publications, as did Mitch Pomerantz; Ahmad Rahman recruited and coordinated the great volunteers; and Coletta Davis and valuable assistants identified restaurants guests could use outside the hotel.  Mitch Pomerantz worked through all the necessary red tape to have an audible signal installed in front of the hotel to help people in crossing a very busy street.  
	228 tickets were sold for the Welcome to California party on Saturday night.  We had live music from an excellent orchestra found for us by Obbie Schoeman with dancing, many fine prizes, and good food.  Comments of approval and appreciation came from those in attendance and those who stayed out in the lobby and listened to the music.	
	Sheila Styron sang beautifully before the first session on Sunday night, and Roger Petersen led the audience in singing the National Anthem to open the convention.  I welcomed everyone to California on behalf of CCB and expressed the hope that all who attended would have a wonderful time.  Paul Edwards gave an excellent report, and there was a presentation of awards, which will be covered in the Braille Forum.  The remainder of the program included a talk by Charles Crawford, Executive Director of ACB, and the report of the Credentials Committee.   
	Earlier that day I had attended, by invitation,  a membership meeting.  It was conducted by professional facilitators who had us prioritize ways in which to increase membership in the next two years.  The meeting was most interesting and offered some useful suggestions: that we coordinate our communications, prepare leadership training materials, and develop tools for public relations toward getting more publicity and securing grants.  
	On July 5, it was my pleasure to play the piano before the general session began.  Throughout the week door prizes were given, the majority of which came from California.  The Compton chapter had volunteered to get prizes for us,  and we saw a greater number at this convention than was usual in the past.  The Compton chapter can really be proud of the job they did for us.  Larry Seiber, our Office Manager--assisted by Darryl Skivers and volunteers from the audience--took charge of calling the winners' names and presenting the prizes.  As occurs in CCB, each general session began with an invocation and the salute to the flag.  
	The first program item on which I will report was a presentation by James Ervin of Albany, Georgia--the newly installed president of Lions International--who talked about the work the Lions are doing with the prevention of blindness throughout the world.  He gave statistics on how many people are being helped, particularly in under-developed countries.  One and a half million men and women in Lions organizations live and work in 85 countries.  The second Thursday in October will be World Sight Day celebrated in communities all over the world.   
	Mark Richert from the American Foundation of the Blind addressed issues relating to Social Security, confessing right at the start that there is just no way to make this topic interesting even though it is extremely important.  He emphasized that SSDI is an insurance program financed by recipients who are entitled to its benefits.  About 110,000 of those recipients are blind.  SSI, on the other hand, is a program for people who are needy.  Though the Social Security System is the largest bureaucracy in the world, the blind are only a small minority of the 8 million people receiving services.  The many and varied programs involved with employment and health benefits administered under Social Security should be known to us all; tapes of the ACB convention are available and will contain a fuller treatment of the subject than I can give here.  I plan to have the tape recorded to send to those who want it.   
	Julie Carroll, an advocacy attorney employed by the Paralyzed Veterans of America, talked to us about pedestrian safety issues, followed by Janet Barlow on matters relating to access.  The many research projects and surveys being conducted  and results of those in California were discussed.  Questions were raised about bird call signals, the location and operation of push buttons, and other strategies used by blind persons in safely navigating busy thoroughfares.  It was interesting to hear that Australia has various kinds of tones to locate their signs, suggesting other possible approaches to traffic solutions. 
	Lucas Frank had more to say about traffic control devices.  He believes that audible push buttons should be placed at all crosswalks at an intersection and that Braille, large print, and tactile identifiers should be used as well.  He advocated a standard locator tone and demonstrated various signals.  There is room for solutions in the proposed transportation budget.
	Stuart Wittenstein, Superintendent of the California School for the Blind, gave a fine presentation detailing what is happening at the school.  There are 6,000 blind and visually impaired students in California, 130 of whom are at CSB.  Braille fortune cookies sold by the school exemplify one of the student business efforts.  The school has a student council and a jazz orchestra which entertains at many community functions.  
	ACB awarded approximately $60,000 in scholarships to blind and visually impaired students, the individual presentations being made by Dr. John Buckley, ACB Scholarship Chair, who introduced the winners and explained their educational goals.  The Kurzweil Foundation and Ray Kurzweil presented each of them with a $1,000 check, the Kurzweil 1000 reading machine, a scanner, and a plaque with the inscription in braille and print.   Three of the scholarship winners were from California. 
	Erlene Hughes, ACB's Web Master, discussed the Web site which includes the Washington Connection, the Job Bank, the Braille Forum, all the resolutions passed by the organization since its beginning in the 1960s; the current ACB constitution and bylaws; and information of value to many of the special interest affiliates. 
	Oral Miller discussed the importance of sports for blind and visually impaired people.  He introduced Kevin Szott, a blind man who played football throughout school and is heavily engaged in sports. 
	Judy Dixon from National Library Services described the improved mailing containers for braille books in general use now, the transfer of 12 more magazines from flexible disk to cassette, some additions to the magazine program, and the expectations ahead for digital talking books. 
	Barbara Caruso, a talking book reader from the American Foundation for the Blind for more than  20 years, spoke of the pleasure she derives from reading fiction.  Like many others who do this work, she has a background in acting and has been in recent dramatic performances on Broadway. 
	Charles Crawford moderated a panel on rehabilitation, "What Works to Get You to Work."  Half of the states have separate agencies concerned with employment for the blind and disabled; and in these agencies it appears that more people are served and gain employment than in states where the blind are served in the same agency as all other disabilities.  A member of the panel was Jim Gibbons, president of National Industries for the Blind.  Blind himself with a background as an industrial engineer, he worked for a time for AT&T, and in credit marketing.  Burt Boyer of the Lions Blind Center and I had an opportunity to meet with him during the convention about employment possibilities in Oakland.  
	Other interesting presentations included a panel concerning the work of Mobility International and the Clearinghouse on Disability and Exchange; a talk by Brian Charlson about cooperative efforts with Microsoft; an account by Michael Simpson, president of the Blind Citizens of Australia, of the similarities and differences between that organization and ACB; information conveyed by a guest from Japan on work for the blind there; and the many resolutions read by Michael Byington, Resolutions Committee Chair, that are summarized in a later article.
	Besides all the informative talks and discussions, the routine work of the organization was carried forward.  An election produced the following officers: Paul Edwards, President; Brian Charlson, First Vice President; Pamela Shaw, Second Vice President; Cynthia Towers, Secretary; and Pat Beatty, Treasurer.  Several changes were also made to the constitution and by-laws that will appear in The Braille Forum.  
	At the banquet Saturday evening, Roger Peterson received the  Durward K. Mc Daniel award about which a separate article appears later in this issue.  Kenny Johnson, a member of the Greater Los Angeles chapter, provided entertainment as an excellent comedian. 	The ACB convention for 2000 will be held in Louisville, Kentucky; for 2001 in Des Moines, Iowa; and for 2002 back in Houston, Texas.
	As host affiliate president, I was busy most of the time.  One of the things that generated a lot of interest was the agreement between CCB and Wells Fargo Bank about ATM accessibility.  I was asked to do an interview for ACB Reports which was aired in August.  It was also my pleasure to meet with Jim McGivern and help with information for the ACB history.
	I wish that all of you could have attended this convention.  It was one of the best.  We had 80 exhibitors; and,  although the exhibits had to be moved at the last minute to the Marriott Hotel to satisfy fire regulations, the shuttle service was great and members enjoyed the exhibits.  It was an opportunity for old friends to get together and a chance to make new ones.  My thanks to all Californians who came to the convention and helped make our affiliate proud.  You were great!


	CAREER CONNECTIONS

	by Catherine Schmitt

	It is estimated that 70% of all jobs are gotten through word of mouth.  The individuals who have benefited from this job search approach have developed relationships with others that have proved to be supportive in their career lives.  These relationships range from formal friendships to mentoring.  Managers have also indicated that a key element to a worker's success in the corporate world is a "role model."
	Mentoring relationships can happen in many areas of one's life and be beneficial to an individual's career success.  There are both formal and informal mentoring programs.  The formal programs pair individuals based upon common interests or needs in work settings or organizations.  Informal mentoring can take place anywhere and at any time.  
	Think about the relationships that you have with others.  Have you had a teacher who took extra time to help you learn an additional mathematical concept, a coach who taught you how to swim, or even a supervisor who gave you the historical perspective on how a certain decision had been made at work?  These individuals may have been formal or informal mentors, but they all added to your knowledge and self-confidence.
	Many successful workers can look back and identify one, two or maybe several individuals who had a critical impact on their career development and success.  These are the persons who are willing to share their experiences, knowledge and advice with a
protege.  A mentor can identify a protege or the protege can seek out the mentor.  The relationship may begin as an agreed upon arrangement or develop gradually and even unplanned between two people with time and interest in one another.  Either way, here are some characteristics to help you become a better mentor or protege.
	Excellent mentors are good listeners, willing to share their expertise.  They have earned respect based on ability and trust.  Mentors also need to understand and be willing to share ideas about the work culture and norms to assist proteges.  You may find yourself already in the mentor role without even realizing it; or you may decide that you want to identify specifically someone to mentor.  Mentoring relationships are of limited duration, and proteges will grow and move on to greater endeavors because of the positive contributions that mentors have made possible.  
	While everyone has the opportunity to learn from a mentor, proteges who possess certain traits can benefit more from the relationship.  If they show a high degree of independence, have the ability to communicate with people, and take responsibility for their own learning, they will reap the benefits of the mentoring they have received.  
	A successful protege is also willing to adjust his/her schedule to work on projects that are of particular importance to the boss.  This enthusiastic response to the boss's requests indicates the level of commitment and loyalty the employee has to the job and to the organization.  This in turn encourages the boss to trust the employee with additional responsibilities or projects.  An initial step toward advancing the mentor relationship is to ask questions and inquire if the individual can spend some time sharing his/her expertise.  Suggest that you meet for lunch or an afternoon break and ask for the person's assistance; or schedule an appointment to meet with the person to discuss your career interests, inviting suggestions about the skills you will need to be successful.  
	The effective mentor-protege relationship requires a high degree of interaction.  Discussions can be informal and personal as well as technical and organizationally based.  The key to a successful relationship is the mutuality of trust and respect.  Mentoring is a rewarding experience for the mentor and the protege.  Resolve today to participate in the life long chain of learning and growing.  
	A valuable reference on this subject is Harvey Garrett's Give Yourself a Present.  


	A MESSAGE FROM GUIDE DOGS FOR THE BLIND, INC.

	by Debra Barnes, Director of Development

	The Summer '99 issue of The Blind Californian included a reprint of an article that appeared in the Chronicle newspaper regarding Guide Dogs for the Blind, Inc.  We feel the article was unfair, as it tried to mislead the reader into thinking that there was something wrong with the way Guide Dogs conducts its finances.  I can assure you that this is not--and has never been--the case.  
	I would also like to thank the many graduates of our school, guide dog users from other schools, contributors and even strangers who sent us copies of their letters to the editor of the newspaper.  Your efforts on our behalf were much appreciated by our staff.  We were disappointed those letters were never printed in the Chronicle.  
	I would like to give you some facts and another view of finances at Guide Dogs.  In the 1940s, Guide Dogs' Board of Directors set aside some funds to create an endowment.  Just as you might save money in a pension plan, the organization wanted to ensure that our mission would continue in the future despite fluctuations in the economy.  This savings plan is vital to an organization which does not receive any government funding--and it is especially vital to a mission that is as complex and multi-faceted as ours.  We receive annual, voluntary contributions from donors who can see the real value and importance of our mission.  These donations are combined with funds from our endowment to cover our operating expenses.  In the past five years, Guide Dogs has substantially increased its endowment, due to an unusually strong investment market coupled with our prudent management.  
	In those same five years, we've established an entirely new campus, thereby effectively eliminating the waiting list for those accepted to our training program.  We increased our staff and services and graduated 45% more teams.  Some examples of our new services include: providing training to people with custom needs, specializing training for those with low vision and providing continued assessment classes to give more consideration to those applicants with extenuating circumstances.  We've added counseling services to assist students in class, help people with the loss or retirement of their dogs, and assist with the transition from class to the home environment.  We've added escalator access and other improvements in our training.  We've greatly expanded our Graduate Agency Representative program as well as other outreach efforts.  We are working with the media as well as the restaurant and travel industries to promote education about access.  The guidance and suggestions from our Graduate Advisory Council contribute invaluably and provide direction for changes and improvements to our program.  Guide Dogs has established a strategic plan to the year 2002. 
	Most well-managed nonprofits who have been in existence for many years have seen fit to create endowments. The current trend in nonprofit fundraising is to establish endowments, since government and other funding sources have proven unreliable year-to-year.  We currently spend on average 14% of our endowment's value each year.  If we were to use up our endowment, we would soon need to raise another 5 million dollars each year or cut services.  
	Our endowment fully supports our three promises - 
* To provide quality dogs and training
* To offer quality follow-up services for the life of the dog
* To ensure that we'll be here when you come for a successor dog.
	Our mission is clear and indeed relevant.  It is estimated that around 1.1 million people are severely visually impaired.  Approximately 10,000 people with vision loss in America currently use dogs as guides.  Our main challenge is to find ways to inform people about our free services and about the benefits of using dogs as guides.  Technological advances such as global positioning and talking signs will work in tandem with the use of guide dogs, not replace them, as was inferred in the article.  People who are blind or visually impaired deserve choice in determining which mobility aid works best for them.
	Please contact Guide Dogs for the Blind if you have any questions about the article or our program.  We feel our improvements and successes should be a cause for celebration, as they will ultimately benefit the blind community.  Thank you for giving us this opportunity to respond.


	THE NEW KILLING FIELDS: AMERICA'S INTERSECTIONS 

           by Charles Crawford 

   (This was a response to material in The Baltimore Sun 
concerning the death of a blind pedestrian.)
	On June 12, 1999, Bethel Mines and her husband Raymond were struck by a delivery vehicle that left Bethel dead.  Raymond now lies in the hospital in critical condition.  Six months ago a man in Virginia named Joe was killed by a cable company van.  Less than a year ago Carolyn Garret, who lived in Texas, was struck and  killed on her way to a Christian school where she was studying to be a counselor.  All of these people and many more who could be mentioned had one thing in common: they were blind.  Moreover, each of them had lives and families.  Each of them had their joys and sorrows like the rest of us, and each of them died in America's new killing fields as they simply dared to cross an intersection.
	Each year approximately 5,000 pedestrians die from being struck by vehicles.  When viewed over time, this is roughly the same rate of killing of our soldiers in Vietnam.  How does our public reaction differ?  Remember how hundreds of thousands marched on Washington and conducted massive rallies around the nation to protest the war?  Now, today, how many have rallied to protest this killing?
	The American Council of the Blind is a national consumer organization that has been working day and night to prevent as many needless deaths of blind pedestrians as possible.  The disproportionate rate of blind and visually impaired     pedestrians being killed or maimed has caused us to work with traffic engineers and other pedestrian groups to stop the carnage.  While we have made some real progress in getting public officials to recognize the value of accessible traffic signals 
that can be located, heard, and used by blind folks, and while our law suits have gotten safety warning strips at subway and other platforms, more and more pointless deaths will happen until our society truly considers the following. 
	We have surrendered our communities to faceless bureaucracies and distant politicians who orient themselves to the ever-growing demands of vehicular traffic and urban sprawl.  Their decisions are made to move traffic along with ever more complex intersection design and with ever decreasing attention to the pedestrian infrastructure.  From so-called round-abouts, where pedestrians have to make eye contact with drivers and "claim the intersection," to multi-angular crossings with complex traffic patterns, these decision makers consistently put pedestrians at risk--a truly lethal gamble that only increases with blindness.
	Why do we let it happen?  Until our child, parent, spouse, relative or friend is struck, it's just a tragic accident.  Combine these conditions with disappearing sidewalks where folks once met each other as they walked and talked as neighbors, and it is easy to understand how we simply continue to lose the personal contact with each other that once reinforced the fabric of our society and gave meaning and action to concern for others.  Now we rely upon more impersonal ways of communicating that distance us from the full realities and make tragedy an abstraction.
	We can never fully stop all pedestrian accidents.  We can, however, re-engineer our environment to prevent the bulk of them and rebuild an America based upon people knowing people.  For all the folks who have died and for those who remain at risk, isn't it time we do it?
	We can get in touch with our local politicians and ask them about why sidewalks are not available.  We can get in touch with our local traffic engineers and ask them what they are doing to create accessible signalized intersections for blind folks and safer traffic patterns for all.  We can get in touch with our community leaders at our churches and philanthropic organizations to ask them how we and they can make a difference.  We can most of all look into ourselves to ask the question: do we care enough to stop the killing and help rebuild our community?
	The American Council of the Blind and other pedestrian safety groups cannot bring back Bethel, Carolyn, Joe or all the others.  We can, however, ask you to join with us in protecting and celebrating life and community rather than looking the other way.  Call the American Council of the Blind in Washington at 202-467-5081 or visit our web site at www.acb.org and take a look at our Pedestrian Safety link.
	Please help.  It's not just blind folks who are relying upon you.  It's children, ordinary adults and seniors who need a safe community in which to grow, contribute and live. 


	TECHNOLOGY REPLACING BRAILLE

	Submitted by Mitch Pomerantz

 	(The following article, written by L.A. Times staff writer Scott Martelle, appeared on July 28, 1999.) 

	Only 85,000 of the 1 million legally blind people in the U.S.  use the venerable system.  Reliance on audiotapes and magnifiers leaves many others functionally illiterate.  

	Jeffrey Senge remembers exactly when braille went out and the audiotapes came in.  
     It happened at the end of fourth grade at a Santa Rosa elementary school, nearly 40 years ago.  During the summer, for reasons he never learned, his teacher was replaced.  And so was the braille-based program he was using to improve his reading skills.  
     Fifth grade, Senge now believes, marked the end of his own literacy.  "I really missed out.  I've struggled ever since," said Senge, 50, who used tapes and letter magnifiers to earn a Master's degree in Special Education from Cal State Fullerton.  "Everybody was sincerely trying to do a good job, but did not think about it clearly, as far as the effect on literacy is concerned."       	

	To braille advocates, Senge's experience represents the early stages of educational changes that are now coming home to roost: a ballooning population of intelligent, blind adults who are functionally illiterate.  The American Foundation for the Blind estimates that out of about a million legally blind people in the country, only 85,000 use braille.  
     The reason, they say, is that increasing reliance on tape recorders, letter magnifiers and computer voice translators leaves the visually impaired with a shaky grasp of the underlying structure of language.  . . . 
     And the numbers are increasing.  The percentage of legally blind students learning braille--a reading method that breaks language into a code of raised dots--has dropped precipitously from 53% in 1963 to 10% in 1997, according to statistics compiled by the American Printing House for the Blind in Louisville, Ky., a not-for-profit company that conducts an annual national census of blind students.  
     Statewide, about 21% of the visually impaired school-age children capable of learning to read use braille as their primary method, according to statistics compiled last year by state education officials.  In Los Angeles County, the number is 35%; in Orange County, 20%.  
     Yet braille can be the key to quality of life for the blind.  Nine of ten blind adults who have jobs read and write braille, making braille literacy critical for a segment of the population suffering from 70% unemployment, said Marc Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind in Baltimore.  
     Harder to measure is the intellectual and artistic void that illiteracy leaves.  Unable to read, large numbers of blind Americans find themselves sealed off from the kind of sustenance that can come from losing oneself in a good book.  
     "It's difficult to say actually how many people use braille," said Frances Mary D'Andrea of the foundation.  "Some use it for labeling or just know the alphabet for home use.  They may not be people who sit down and read a braille book.  It's really hard to get numbers for that."  
     Reading braille can be laborious.  The system, designed by Louis Braille in Paris in 1824, uses a series of six raised dots, in a pattern like the number 6 on game die, to represent the alphabet.  It is read by running the fingertips over the dots.  Although it is time-consuming, advocates say, it still is faster than using magnifiers.  
	Benefits of Early Training: Literacy rates among the blind could be improved, according to a 1996 doctoral study by a graduate student at the University of Washington, by teaching braille to the visually impaired while they are young at the same time seeing students are taught to read.  
     The study found that legally blind students who learned braille at the same time sighted students learned to read achieved, at the high school level, literacy rates similar to their sighted classmates.  Students who learned braille later or were taught to read using their limited vision and magnification devices suffered high rates of illiteracy.  
     The study's author, Ruby Ryles, now an adjunct faculty member at the Louisiana Center for the Blind and Louisiana Tech University, said the work affirmed the importance of braille in helping young blind students understand the basic structure of language.  
     Jan Wadsworth, program specialist for the Azusa Unified School District's program for visually impaired students, discounted the link between braille literacy and employability, arguing that social skills play a more significant role for blind job-seekers.  The reason: they need to win over potential employers who are uncomfortable with directing blind staffers.  
     "[Employers] react personally to the fact that they can't make eye contact," said Wadsworth, whose program provides services for blind children in 11 nearby school districts.  
     Kim Lindley, director of staff development and former coordinator of special education for Capistrano Unified School District, argued that visual impairments vary too much to apply general approaches.  Some children have enough vision to read traditional textbooks using enlarged print or magnifiers.  And some children with vision problems might also have motor skills problems that make reading braille especially difficult.  
     "Many things come into literacy and effective comprehension," she said.  "It's not a black and white issue." 
     Theresa vanEttinger falls into that gray area.  Born blind, vanEttinger's school in her native Montana initially insisted she be taught her ABCs using her extremely limited sight and enlarged print, despite her family's request that she be taught braille as a hedge against the future.  
     "They said she didn't need [braille] because she could still read print," said her mother, Ruth vanEttinger.  "So we went through the back door.  I wasn't a teacher of the blind and I knew nothing but I decided I'd better learn it and teach it to her." 
     The family sued the state and won access to braille instruction.  The mother eventually became certified to teach braille and, after the family moved to California, became a teacher of the visually impaired in Azusa.  
     Theresa vanEttinger, now a 22-year-old music student at Citrus College, says: "My literacy is as good as any sighted person's." 
     California regulations require schools to assess individual students' problems and devise an Individual Education Plan and to make braille instruction available.  However, the laws do not require schools to teach braille to blind and visually impaired students.  
     Pro-braille activists say a tide of educational and technological changes has worked against braille literacy.  Key among them is the 20-year-old practice of integrating blind students into regular public school classes, diffusing the population of blind students and making it more difficult for teachers to specialize and keep up with braille.  
     As it is, few teachers even accept the calling.  Only 10 students trained as braille specialists graduated this spring from Cal State L.A. and San Francisco State--the only colleges in the state that prepare teachers of blind and visually impaired students, according to Jamie Dote-Kwan, coordinator of Cal State L.A.'s teacher training programs in visual impairment and blindness.  
     "We have had shortages of teachers in this field for 20 years," Dote-Kwan said.  "There are positions all over the state that we can't fill." 
     Jack Hazekamp, a consultant in the state Department of Education's Special Education Division, acknowledged that mainstreaming programs, while well-intentioned, have hindered the teaching of braille.  
     "It really takes intense teaching, particularly at the primary level," he said.  
     At the same time, the number of people with visual impairments has risen, according to the American Printing House for the Blind.  The total number of blind students eligible for specialized reading materials more than tripled from 1963 to 1997 from 17,300 to 56,690, the organization found.  At the same time, the number of braille readers dropped from 9,123 to 5,439--a 40% decrease.  
     Some of those statistics can be attributed to such factors as increased numbers of critically ill and premature babies who survive, often with multiple disabilities that would make it difficult for them to read under any circumstances.  Also, the growing population of elderly people means that more are going blind late in life when it is more difficult to learn a new method of reading.  
	Technology Has Limits: Advocates for the blind say the trend away from braille has not turned around despite several years of lobbying for better state and federal laws.  "The infrastructure isn't there," said Maurer of the National Federation of the Blind.  "In order to have people who are literate who are blind, you have to have folks who believe in blind people, who believe in braille, and somebody prepared to produce it." 
     Technology can be seductive, he said, but the machines have their own limits.  For example, early vocalization software, which converted text to sound, worked well.  But later innovations--particularly on the Internet--have reduced their effectiveness.  The flashy images that make Web sites appealing for the sighted wreak havoc on the vocalization programs, rendering them ineffective about 70% of the time, he said.  
     Rachel Heuser, who teaches visually impaired students at Castille Elementary School in Mission Viejo, said she believes braille is critical for blind students to become literate.  But sometimes, she said, the difficulty of braille precludes students from learning it.  
     Readers of enlarged print take 50% longer to read the same material as a sighted reader.  Braille readers take twice as long as a sighted reader to absorb the same material.  
     Kelli Kay of Rancho Santa Margarita never had a choice of instruction for her son, Derek Czajka, who was born totally blind.  When her son was 3, she said, he was exposed to braille through programs at the Braille Institute, and has continued with braille instruction under Heuser at Castille Elementary.  Last year, as an 8-year-old second-grader, he excelled on a literacy test that measures reading ability for braille readers from third grade into adulthood, Kay said.  
     Paradoxically, publishers of braille material say they are producing more books now than before, as braille readers continue seeking out material to read.  The Los Angeles-based Braille Institute has its own braille press--the largest braille publisher on the West Coast.  Over a 20-year span, the braille press has more than tripled its output, from 1.9 million pages in 1977 to 5.8 million pages in 1997.  
     For Senge, though, the increased amount of braille reading material represents lost opportunity.  With his limited literacy, they are books he will probably never read.  
     "Think about the challenges people have in life who don't have a sufficient mastery of the written language," said Senge, director of a Cal State Fullerton program that transcribes reading assignments into braille for California college students.  "It puts you in the category of being illiterate." 
     The limits of technology, from tape players to computerized reader, quickly become evident, he said.  "It's seductive at the beginning," he said.  "When you're a little kid, you think this is easy, you don't have to struggle with [learning to read].  You become attracted to it.  But at some point, it comes back to bite you." 


	OUT OF THE DOGHOUSE

                        by Melita Waters

     I have been reading and hearing something lately that 
you might be interested in knowing.  This is not by way of legal advice, but it is something that you should be aware of nonetheless.  
     Whether or not your dog is a guide, you should acquire--and your dog should be wearing--a city or county license, whichever is applicable in your area.
     If you do not have a valid dog license, you may be denied, as some persons have been, access just for that reason.  In a case like this, your ADA rights seem to go right out the window since your dog is not licensed as a dog.  It is, after all, a dog before it is a guide.  
     I know of county and city office workers who will tell you that your dog doesn't need to have a license, but this is not a chance you should take.  This may be the case in your city or county; but if you lack the proper license, the city or county next door is within its rights to use against you your failure to have the appropriate tags. 
     Not so very long ago, the animal control people in the next town from were going door to door citing people if they couldn't show their dogs' rabies certificate and license tags.  The officers didn't care if the dog in question was a service animal or not.  
     Why not save yourself the trouble and have your dog properly licensed?  Much of the time the fees are waived, and it will cost you nothing.  Even if they are not, you will probably get a discounted rate because your guide is altered.  As often as not, you don't even have to go anywhere to get the license.  It can all be done by mail after a phone call to the proper department.  You can discover where that is by calling the non-emergency number of your police department.  No matter how it sounds, the process is easier than it seems.
     I hope you all have a pleasant autumn.


	CALIFORNIA COUNCIL ANNOUNCES "TALKING ATM' AGREEMENT"
	WITH MAJOR CALIFORNIA BANK

	On Wednesday, June 24, 1999, the California Council of the Blind (CCB) announced a landmark settlement under which Wells Fargo,California's second largest bankk, will develop and install talking ATM's for blind and visually impaired users.  This is the first agreement of its kind in the country.
	In addition to requiring talking ATM's, the agreement also sets up a process to ensure that the bank's print information is effectively communicated to blind and low-vision customers.  Here are the details. 
	Over the next twelve months, Wells Fargo will work with its principal ATM manufacturers to develop and test talking ATM's.  Within this time, 20 talking ATM's will be installed in the Bay Area, Los Angeles and San Diego for a pilot test.  
	After a successful pilot  test, Wells Fargo has committed to installing one ATM at each location in California where there are Wells Fargo ATM's.  This includes supermarkets, public facilities, and stand-alone locations as well as bank branches.
	The first 100 ATM's will be installed in locations throughout California by September 1, 2000.  50% of all locations will have talking ATM's by December, 2001 and by June 30, 2003, 95% of all Wells Fargo locations will have talking ATM's.
	The talking ATM's will enable a blind or vision-impaired user to withdraw cash, deposit money, transfer between designated accounts, and purchase stamps by the use of prerecorded audible messages that guide the user through each step of the transactions.  
	All audible information will be delivered privately through use of a standard earphone which the bank will provide.  
	 By November 1, 1999, Wells Fargo will set up a process to ensure effect communication of all print materials.  Possible alternative formats identified in the CCB agreement include: qualified readers, taped texts, audio recordings, brailled materials, large print materials, magnifiers as long as magnification or strength are identified, or other effective methods of making print material available.
	As part of the agreement, after a request from a person who is blind or visually impaired, Wells Fargo will begin waiving fees associated with the use of its telephone banking services.  There will also be no charge for alternative formats.
	For further information about the historic CCB TALKING ATM settlement or to discuss ways of getting other banks to install talking ATM's, contact the lawyers who handled the case for the Council: Lainey Feingold, 510-848-8125; Linda Dardarian, 888-316-8870.


	BIAS AGAINST PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES 

	IN THE LEGAL PROFESSION

                         by Ralph Black

	You might think that attorneys and judges, who understand the law, would not be likely to discriminate against persons with disabilities who wish to enter the legal profession.  Unfortunately, this is often not the case.  Indeed, while many persons with visual impairments or other disabilities have entered the legal profession, they have often had to do so in the face of pervasive and significant discrimination.  Non-disabled attorneys and judges often harbor the same fears and stereotypes about disability that give rise to discrimination in other professions.  
	In addition, blind or visually impaired attorneys must be prepared to function in a profession which is heavily information based.  Although this Barrier can be overcome by the use of readers, scanners, computers with screen reading or enlargement software and other accommodations, employers may not realize this or may, despite the law, allow concerns about accommodating persons with disabilities to influence their decisions about hiring and promotion.
	The best figures on the prevalence of disability come from current population reports, Americans With Disabilities: 1994-95, U.S. Census Bureau, August 1997.  This report is based on data collected in the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), which is a national sample survey conducted by the U.S. Census.  The report shows that 15,436,000 or about 13.6% of the 113,832,000 employed persons age 21 to 64 in the U.S. have some form of disability.  Unfortunately, the representation rate of persons with disabilities in the legal profession in California is far lower.  In 1991, a State Bar Demographic Survey revealed that approximately 6% of survey respondents identified themselves as having a disability.
	Part of this disparity can be attributed to Barriers to entry into the profession which persons with disabilities continue to face in law school and in the Bar exam.  While many law schools have removed the most obvious architectural Barriers, significant problems still remain for law students with disabilities, especially those with learning disabilities and visual impairments who require accommodations in order to be able to process the vast volumes of written material law students are expected to handle.  Furthermore, when a student with a disability does manage to get through law school, he or she may well face a prolonged battle with Bar Examiners over accommodations on the Bar Exam.  A suit is now pending challenging the denial of accommodations by the California Committee of Bar Examiners.  The prospects for such challenges were substantially improved by the recent landmark ruling in Bartlett v.  New York State Board Of Law Examiners in which the Second Circuit held that a learning disabled student was entitled to accommodations in taking the New York Bar exam.  In the Bartlett case, the Court aptly described the legal rights of Bar applicants with disabilities when it stated "The ADA and the
Rehabilitation Act do not guarantee Dr. Bartlett examination conditions that will enable her to pass the Bar examination--that she must achieve on her own.  What Congress did provide for, and what the Board has previously denied her, is the opportunity to take the examination on a level playing field with other applicants." 
	The eager young attorney with a disability who does pass the Bar exam will, however, soon be dismayed to discover that his or her battle with bias is far from over.  In 1993, a follow-up Survey of Attorneys and Judges with disabilities and chronic medical Conditions by the State Bar Subcommittee on the Employment of Attorneys with Disabilities (EAD) found that bias and discrimination against persons with disabilities remains widespread within the profession.  A substantial percentage of respondents reported experiencing bias in the form of having heard disparaging remarks about persons with disabilities by judges (18%), court personnel (19%), superiors (35%), peers (34%), opposing counsel (30%) and clients (24%).  Similarly, these same lawyers and judges perceive their population to receive less professional respect than their counterparts by judges (19%), court staff (23%), superiors (30%), peers (21%), opposing counsel (35%), and clients (28%). 
	The most striking result of these attitudinal Barriers is the fact that few attorneys with disabilities work in private law firms.  Most work for public agencies or undertake the risky proposition of solo practice.  Moreover, a substantial majority of respondents to the EAD survey felt attorneys with disabilities had less opportunity for advancement and received less compensation than their non-disabled counterparts.    
	Those attorneys with disabilities who do get jobs are often reluctant to ask for accommodations they need.  According to the Demographic Survey, 44% of respondents did not request needed accommodations because they anticipated adverse reactions from others or feared professional repercussions.
	As an outgrowth of the EAD survey, in 1995 the State Bar established the Standing Committee on Legal Professionals with Disabilities (CLPD) to address the problems faced by attorneys with disabilities.  In June, 1996, at the request of CLPD, the Board of Governors of the State Bar adopted model policies on employment of, and reasonable accommodation for, attorneys with disabilities.  Subsequently, CLPD launched a campaign which resulted in over a hundred leading California law firms adopting these model policies and pledging to recruit, hire and promote qualified attorneys with disabilities.  It is clear, however, that those seeking to enter or advance in the legal profession must know their rights and be prepared to advocate on behalf of themselves with the same skill they would employ in representing their clients.  Law students, attorneys, and judges with disabilities are, of course, covered by the provisions of Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) which prohibits discrimination in employment.  In California, there are also state law provisions designed to prevent discrimination against persons with disabilities.  The Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) (Government Code Section 12900 et seq.) prohibits discrimination in employment on various grounds, including mental and physical disability.  The FEHA may be particularly valuable for attorneys with disabilities working or seeking to work in small firms since it covers employers with five or more employees, whereas Title I of the ADA covers only employers with 15 or more employees.  Attorneys with disabilities encountering discrimination from businesses other than their employers (e.g.  other law firms or companies providing training) will want to keep in mind that the Unruh Act (Civil Code Section 51 et seq.) forbids discrimination on the basis of disability by such businesses and provides for minimum statutory damages of $1,000 per violation.  In addition, on January 1, 1996, the Judicial Council adopted California Rule of Court 989.3 providing that "any lawyer, party, witness, juror, or any other individual with an interest in attending any proceeding before any court of this state," may make an ex parte application to the court requesting disability-related accommodations."  
	Finally, if you are a visually impaired attorney or a student thinking of  going to law school, you'll want to know about organizations representing the interests of attorneys with disabilities.  As of this writing, the status of the Committee on Legal Professionals with Disabilities is uncertain because of the fact that the State Bar itself lost much of its funding and staffing
 last year as a result of a battle over State Bar dues.  Fortunately, the American Council of the Blind has a special affiliate, the American Blind Lawyers, with a membership of several hundred blind attorneys, law students, and judges throughout the country.  The American Bar Association Commission on Mental and Physical Disabilities can also put you in touch with others in the profession.  
	Law can be a rewarding career, but overcoming the lingering bias in the profession can be a challenge even for the best trained legal advocate.   




	SCVB MEMBER RECEIVES NATIONAL AWARD 
 	
	by Bernice Kandarian

	(From the newsletter of the Silicon Valley Council of the Blind:)
	SVCB Founding member, Roger Petersen, received the Durward K. McDaniel Ambassador Award at the banquet of the 38th national convention of the American Council of the Blind held in Los Angeles July 2-9.  Roger was nominated by SVCB member Dawn Wilcox who walked with him to the platform for the presentation.
	The name of Durward K. McDaniel was added to the award after his retirement in 1981 from the position of National ACB Representative.  Durward McDaniel was a blind civil rights attorney in Oklahoma in the early 50s before moving to Washington, DC, to open the ACB national office in 1968.  After his retirement, the McDaniels moved to Austin, Texas, where he continued working as a volunteer on countless matters concerning ACB and the blindness community.  Durward died in September, 1994.  
	The award plaque, which is brass on wood and has both print and braille text, is given to a blind individual who, through his/her life activities, has promoted the integration of the blind in the life of the community.  In his acceptance remarks, Roger spoke of the significant part Durward had played in his life.  
	Among previous recipients of the award are "Doc" Watson, Scott Marshall and California's own Juliet Bindt Esterly.
	Congratulations, Roger!


	ACB CONVENTION RESOLUTIONS

	by Jeff Thom

	At the 1999 convention of the American Council of the Blind  (ACB), more than 40 resolutions were considered and over 30 of these were passed.  I am sure that The Braille Forum, the newspaper of the ACB, will include those  resolutions in a future issue; but in the meantime, I have been asked, because of my membership on the ACB Resolutions Committee, to provide an overview of the more important resolutions.  Before commencing this task, I want to applaud the hard work of my fellow committee member from California, Daveed Mandell.
	For ease of discussion, I will first summarize some of the resolutions pertaining to internal ACB matters and then turn to those concerning issues of general applicability to the blind and visually impaired.  
	One resolution, submitted by the CCB and other affiliates and passed unanimously, requires a return to the 7-day ACB convention format.  The convention was informed that this resolution can be implemented at the 2000 convention in Louisville.  Other resolutions were submitted pertaining to convention issues, appointment of ACB committees, and other internal matters.  Some of these were either defeated or referred to an ACB committee or the Board of Directors for future action.  Several of them reflected disagreement with leadership decisions; but I am pleased to be in an organization which, rather than viewing these disagreements negatively, does not require that the rank and file feel obliged to agree with their leaders and the leaders, who are willing to listen to the opinions of ordinary members.  
	Among those resolutions, which did pass, was one directing that an examination be made of the feasibility of avoiding scheduling the convention over the 4th of July.  Aanother provided that guidelines be implemented to exclude as convention exhibitors companies that have been known to engage in unlawful practices.
	The convention passed resolutions dealing with an array of issues of concern to the general population of blind and visually impaired.  Resolutions of interest to braille users included one opposing adopting the proposed Unified  Braille Code and one requesting the National Restaurant Association to promote the use of braille menus by its members.  A resolution that originated  in California regarding braille credit card statements was so heavily amended that the final product urges credit card companies to provide braille credit cards and also a wide range of card-related documents in both braille and large print.  Another resolution, inspired by Barry Weintraub and Flora Beck-Weintraub, demands, among other things, that the United States Department of State make available in accessible formats documents such as passport applications. 
	Two other California-sponsored measures were also passed.  The first one states that it is ACB policy that, when an audible signal is installed at an intersection, that signal be placed at every appropriate corner, except where inconsistent with safety and mobility concerns.  A second resolution urges the Federal Communications Commission to take action with respect to making material shown on television screens, such as program scheduling information, accessible to persons with visual impairments.  A resolution was immediately sent to the Federal Communications Commission regarding the need to adopt comprehensive regulations for telecommunications products and services under the ADA--an action which I am happy to report the FCC took in mid-July.
	I conclude with a brief mention of the topics of several of the other resolutions passed at the convention.  They include resolutions urging passage of measures restoring the earnings linkage under the Social Security Disability Insurance program between elderly persons and the blind; supporting the extension hate-crime legislation to cover persons with disabilities, including users and their guide dogs; expressing ACB policy on the elements necessary for an effective state rehabilitation agency serving the blind and visually impaired; seeking changes in service programs for blind veterans; requiring improvements to the Randolph-Sheppard Vendor program; and concerning the activities of the head of the Rehabilitation Services Administration which the ACB believes give the appearance of partisanship towards the NFB.




	BULLETIN BOARD

	by Keith Black

	For sale: a 20-inch reader; Panasonic Television Products, CVM1: $1500.  Contact Carol and Bob McMains, 142 Wiggins Drive, Pleasant Hill, CA 94523; 925-937-6391.
	From Dialogue Magazine, Spring, 1999: Would you like to receive your Sears credit card bill in braille?  If your answer is yes, call 800-633-0815.  
	Parrot Plus is a new voice recognition personal digital assistant.  The hand-held device is designed to be accessible to people who are visually impaired and includes the following features:  voice recognition telephone directory, voice pad for recording memos, voice planner for making appointments, talking alarm clock, and talking calculator.  It can speak menus and instructions in six languages.  For more information, contact Parrot, #28, Rue Meslay, 75003, Paris, France; 011-33148-87-87-34; Website www.voice- assistant.com/english;  E-mail mohamed.saighe@parrot.fr.  In the U.S., contact Independent Living Aids, Inc., 27 East Mall, Plainview, NY 11803-4404; 800-537-2118; fax 516-752-3135.  
	The Color Macular Reader is a portable, hand-held, color closed-circuit television that offers variable magnification, can be used for writing and reading, and sells for $800.  For more information see Sea Development, 13144 Park Boulevard, Suite G, Seminole, FL 33776; 813-398-0707; fax 813-392-8635.  
	Productivity Works recently released version 2 of pwTelephone, a voice-based browsing product that uses the telephone to search the Internet.  The new version is specifically for Windows 95, 98, and NT.  For more information contact Productivity Works, 7 Belmont Circle, Trenton, NJ 08618; 609-984-8044; E-mail info@prodoworks.com; Website www.prodoworks.com.  
	Now You're Cooking is designed as a speech-friendly electronic cookbook.  The recipes can be searched by ingredient, title, nutrition list, and shopping list.  It can be downloaded at www.ffts.com/download.html for $33 with manual or $27 without a manual.  
	Blindwriters is a new listserv for people who are blind or have low vision and who are interested in writing as a hobby or a profession.  Appropriate topics include, but are not limited to, writing style, discussion of writing opportunities, access to market information, preparation of manuscripts for submission, and how visual impairment affects a person as a writer.  To subscribe send a blank message to  blindwriters--subscribe@onelist.com or visit their Website at www.onelist.com/subscribe.cgi/blindwriters.  
	Concerto Braille is a new braille music notation software program, which enables blind and visually-impaired users to transcribe braille music.  For more information contact Perspective; 207-772-7305; Web site .ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/perspectives. 
	Dialogue Magazine, Summer, 1999: Descriptive Video Service describes visual images for people who are blind or have low vision.  This free nationwide service, available to 80% of American television households, is produced by Boston public broadcaster WGBH.  DVS has described more than 1,600 programs on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS).  For cable customers, DVS has described more than 75 classic movies, which appear weekly on the Turner Classic Movies (TCM) cable network.  To receive DVS on television, a viewer must have either a stereo TV or VCR with Second Audio Program (S.A.P.), standard on most newer stereo TV's and VCR's, or a stand-alone S.A.P. receiver.  The S.A.P. receiver is a device which is able to tune in a channel that carries the descriptions, like tuning a radio.  It can be used along with a TV or alone as audio only.  The receivers are available either pre-tuned or adjustable.  The following manufacturers produce S.A.P. receivers: Compol, Inc. 800-972-0881; Avocet Instruments, Inc. 800-443-0728; and FM Atlas 218-879-7676.  For more information about DVS call 800-333-1203 or visit the Web
site at www.wgbh.org/dvs.  
	The MG Harrington Company is offering a new service to people who have low vision.  The company takes print materials and converts them to computer floppy disk or CD-rom in a format that can be enlarged up to 800 percent for viewing and printing.  The electronic versions also contain links from the table of contents to specific pages and include a search tool.  A demonstration copy is available on request.  For more information contact MG Harrington Company, Box 1778, Manhattan Beach, CA 90267; 310-379-8321.  
	The New York Hall of Science has piloted two new audio tours of the museum.  The tours were designed to address visually-impaired visitors as an integrated part of the general museum public.  Museum information in braille, large print, and on computer disk is part of the pilot tours.  The exhibits in the pilot tours are "Hidden Kingdoms:  The World of Microbes," and "Seeing the Light," which focuses on the properties of color, light, and the mechanisms of human visual perception.  For more information, contact the New York Hall of Science, 47-01 111th Street at 48th Avenue, Flushing Meadows, Corona Park, NY 11368; Web site www.nyhallsci.org.  
	A new computer newsletter called "Computer Bytes" is now available online at www.osl.state.or.us/tbabs/compbytes.html.  
	Talking E-mail, version 1.2, is a new product from 4Developers that informs users when an E-mail message is received and reads the message aloud.  The program works with Windows 95, 98, and NT4 and requires only an E-mail account and a sound card.   Users can customize whether they want to hear who sent the message, its subject, and how many lines of the message should be read.  The program uses Microsoft Agent technology to achieve its voice quality.  Talking E-mail costs $19.95 and can be ordered on-line from www.4developers.com/talkmail.  A trial version is also available.  For more information, contact 4Developers LLC, 912 East Evelyn Avenue, Sunnyvale, CA 94086; E-mail sales@4developers.com. 
  

From the Matilda Ziegler Magazine, June 1999

Knowledge Database.  The American Printing House for the Blind is building the Fred's Head Database, a collection of tips, tricks and alternative techniques for people who are blind or visually impaired.  Fred's Head is an "expert database" that captures and
makes available the knowledge and experience of many different
people.  APH invites readers to share their ideas, from simple
solutions to detailed discussions of complex processes.  For
example, sample topics include how to mark hotel keys, do audio
tone-indexing, sewing, and searching for jobs.  Send ideas on
diskette, tape, braille, print or E-mail to Fay Leach, APH, 1839
Frankfort Ave., P.O. Box 6085, Louisville, KY 40206-0085; 
800-223-1839, 502-899-2378, or leach@aph.org.  Hadley Catalog.  The Hadley School for the Blind has just published a new edition of its course catalog.  Available in braille, large print, tape and diskette, the catalog describes 91 courses offered to blind people, their families and professionals who work with them.  All of Hadley's distance-learning courses are free of charge.   Contact Hadley School for the Blind, 700 Elm St., Winnetka, IL 60093-0299; 847-446-8111, or fax 847-446-9916.  

	Relay Service Book.  "The Telecommunication Relay Service Handbook" was written to make more people aware of and comfortable with using telecommunication relay services.  These services allow hearing- and speech-impaired people to communicate by telephone with nonimpaired people and vice-versa.  The handbook costs $9.95 and can be ordered through bookstores or the publisher, Aegis, 800-828- 6961 (ISBN:  1-890154-08-3).  


                      KNOWLEDGE OR CONTROL

                        by Betsy Winnick

     On the recommendation of friends, I joined a local chapter of the California Council of the Blind (CCB) in the mid-80s.  I knew very little about the chapter and even less about the state and national organization.  I was fresh out of college, full of energy, and willing to learn.   
     My personal philosophy is that I am not going to be a member of any group without being an active, working member.  So, still being in the student mode, I began my research.  I started asking the five "W" questions, soon followed up by the "How" question, that all students ask in their quest to write a good term paper.  It wasn't long until I had answers to the "who, when, where" and "why" questions," but the answers to the "what" and "how" questions weren't so easily obtained.
     I got answers to the question "What do the chapter, state and national organizations do?" but I never was quite sure what the duties and responsibilities of each of the chapter officers were nor what the responsibilities or function of chairpersons and committee members were.  When I asked How a certain function--say a fund raising dinner--was done from beginning to end, I met resistance on the part of some chapter members.  One person would tell me what, if anything, he or she knew and would refer me to another person who would furnish a little more information, but it was hard to get the whole picture. 
	I realize that many groups survive with an oral history; but
having been a student, I was used to reading reports that covered all aspects of the topic.  Though I realize that not everyone does well with the written word, It seemed to me that a written report would be a very useful tool to refer to and to pass on to others who might assume that responsibility at a later date.  Other clubs I have belonged to have had such reports and found them valuable, but my suggestion that we follow that practice fell on deaf ears.  
     Some people thought I was trying to take over, but in fact that was far from the truth.  I would just like to know enough to offer my services whenever and wherever I can.  Is it wrong for someone new to want to help?  
	I understand that some things are done the way they are because of tradition, But does that mean that they always have to be done that way?  And by the same people?  I hear enough through the grapevine to know that some people don't necessarily like the way things have always been done and feel that there might be a better way.  Usually their thoughts are shared only with their friends but are not advanced at meetings.  Do they not have enough confidence to stand up in front of the group and say how they feel, or have they done so in the past without seeing any changes?  
     I do not practice passive acceptance, causing some to think that I am a troublemaker just trying to take control.  Before losing my vision, I was an efficiency expert; and some of the behaviors I learned are still with me today.
     I stayed with my chapter until the early 90s when I left to get married and moved away.  I have recently moved back into my old neighborhood and rejoined my old chapter; but I found that nothing had changed much in the intervening eight years.  Pity for them that they voted me back into their chapter!  I haven't changed either; and though some of the faces in
the group are different, there are still enough of the former members around to know how I operate.    
     I learned a lot in college, but one of the things I guess I did not learn was subtlety and tact.  I was a Sociology/Social Services major and found myself tending to be more a directive than an non-directive counselor.  I put something out there and see how the waters will flow.  I feel strongly enough about my ideas to support them and work hard to see that they are as successful as they can be.  
     I am just as supportive of the work of others and will work just as hard to see that their projects are successful.  The opinion I express at a meeting may differ from that of someone else, and there may be discussion and light argumentation between us; but, if the other side wins, I will stand behind 
that group and do what I can to help.  I believe that where our organization is based on the premise of advancing the opportunities of blind and visually impaired people in the community, we need to start within our own organization and show some of our members how they can achieve self-growth.  Some of this comes from developing self-confidence often through the support and encouragement of others.  
     We live in a busy and very exciting world, and not everyone has the time or inclination to spend all his or her free time 
centering on a CCB chapter.  Does anyone know of a handbook or that answers the questions What are the duties and responsibilities of chapter officers?  What are the responsibilities of committee members? Where do the responsibilities of officers end and the responsibilities of
committee members begin? and, lastly, How are certain types of activities carried out, step by step?
     I get around enough to know that I am not the only one asking these questions.  Maybe, though, I am talking only to people who think the way I do.  I know that many are content to just accept what is given to them, but many of that same group are the ones who sit back and gripe because it could have been done in what they considered to be a better way.  Every year I come to realize how true was the article I read many years ago, about how the structure of an organization resembles that of the body's skeletal structure.  You have the backbone of the group, the ones that do most of the work; all the way down to those with arthritic joints who, while not doing the work themselves, do a whole lot of complaining.
	Don't get me wrong; I do my share of complaining, too.  I am fully aware that some of the questions and issues discussed here are taken up at conventions as well; though I found, when I attended these gatherings, that not too much of this type of information was shared.  I hear that things are different now.  It may be that I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.  If there is anyone out there who could help me in my continuing quest, I would be happy to hear from you.  Please send braille, tape or print communication to Betsy Winnick, 347-A Laurel Ave, Hayward, CA 94541.  Feel free to call me at (510) 537-9898.


	FEDERAL LEGISLATION

	by Ahmad Rahman

	Air Carrier Access Act: The Department of Transportation published a new rule amending the Air Carrier Access Act.  This ruling will lift the existing cap on the amount of compensation airlines have to pay passengers for loss or damage to their wheelchairs and other assistive devices.  The ruling covers assistive devices needed by passengers to travel but is not intended to cover electronics and computers which are not essential to passengers' transportation needs.  The term "assistive devices" does, however, cover reading aids and notetaking devices used by blind passengers to travel.  This rule becomes effective on September 1, 1999. 
	ADA Accessibility Guidelines for Recreational Facilities: The U.S. Access Board has published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on the ADA Accessibility Guidelines for Recreational Facilities.  ACB will be submitting comments to the U.S, Access board on this document.  Anyone who has suggestions to be incorporated in ACB's comments should send them by e-mail to Dubroff@acb.org or send them to the ACB national office to the attention of Krista Dubroff: 1155 15th St., N.W., Suite 720, Washington, DC 20005 by November 1, 1999.  The Access Board will be holding public hearings in Dallas, Texas,  and Boston, Massachusetts, on accessible recreational facilities.  The first hearing was held August 22, 1999, at the Hyatt Regency in Dallas.  The second hearing will be on November 1, 1999, at the World Trade Center, 164 Northern Avenue, Room. 306 in Boston.  For more  information contact Peggy Greenwell, U.S. Access Board, 202 -272-5434.


                       EIGHT WAYS TO READ

                         by Keith Black

     Yes, eight.  That should be enough for one blind person, don't you think?  
     Well, it depends.  That's the point, you see.  I have a whole collection of reading methods available to me, but each one requires a special device or set of circumstances to make it useful.  
     Braille is fine, if I can get the hard-copy book or magazine I want in a timely manner, if someone transcribes the material for me, if I write it myself, or if I have the adaptive technology to bring me a refreshable braille display, and if I have the sensitivity of touch to recognize the dot patterns.  
     Tape recording is wonderful if the sound quality is good enough, if I can find a particular word or segment of the text in a hurry, and if a special library or a sighted reader provides the recording.  
     Synthetic speech solves many problems if I have the computer equipment and skills to use it with a network connection or disks that someone has prepared. 
     The Optacon is an amazing device which makes it possible for me to read print if I can get the little camera in the right place, if I have the sensitivity of touch to understand the vibrating lines that form the shapes of letters, if the print is clear enough or in a suitable color, and if I am in no hurry to read.  
     A scanner and reading machine can handle almost any kind of print if the material is not hand-written, if the paper or book can be laid flat on the scanner (not like the label on a can of soup), and if I have the skills and patience to deal with the complex computer commands involved.  
     A little machine called the VoxCom can read me the label on a box or album if I or someone else records the information on a special strip of magnetic tape that is then attached to the container.  
     I can read paper money, too, if I have a four-hundred-dollar money identifier handy.  
     And, I can also read the number on a door or the plaque on a statue, if the characters are big enough and either engraved or raised enough, and if I can get close enough to reach the display. 
     So, you see, I am not really print handicapped, given the right combination of skills, devices, and circumstances.  No one method offers anywhere near the marvelous adaptability of vision, but other totally blind people and I go on striving to master that all-important function called reading.  


	PROGRAM FOSTERS STUDENT INDEPENDENCE

	Submitted by Dan Kysor	
 
	(This article is from The San Jose Mercury News prepared by T. T. Nhu, Mercury News Staff Writer.)
	Dr. Sharon Zell Sacks, 48, has been assistant superintendent for the California School for the Blind in Fremont since 1997.  She is legally blind.  This fall, the school inaugurates a pilot program--the Middle School Preparation Program--to bring blind students full time to the Fremont campus for up to a year of intensive training before they return to their local middle schools.
	Q. What is the purpose of this new program?  
	A. This pilot project is the first of its kind nationally.  Our job is to prepare kids to return to their home school district, and we're hoping for kids to stay for shorter periods to get intensive training in blindness-specific skills that will help them (with) the regular curriculum When they return to their school district.  then a traveling teacher would be hired to serve visually impaired kids in a fairly large geographical area.  The idea is to provide the child with services at his local school whenever possible.
	Q. What is the history of the school for the blind?
	A. The California School for the Blind and Deaf started in San  Francisco in 1860 and moved to Berkeley in 1865, when the programs were put under separate administrations because the needs of the children were so different.  The school was in Berkeley for 115 years and moved to Fremont in 1980.
 	At the time, staff and parents at the school were not happy with the move because Fremont was very rural, and the land around the school was still farmland.  One of the concerns is for blind people to learn to travel on their own and to have access to public transportation, which was difficult in Fremont then.  The school serves the entire state of California.  Two-thirds of the 120 students are residents who go home for the weekend.  There is no tuition charged to parents.  Besides being a school, we're also a state agency serving the needs of blind children all over the state by being a resource to teachers, families, local school districts, and county offices of education.
	Q. How many blind students are there statewide?
	A. Blindness is considered a low-incidence disability, which means there are few blind children of school age--about 6,000 students out of 6 million in California.
	Q. What's the first thing the students have to learn?
	A. How to negotiate their way around our 25-acre campus.  They need to get acclimated to being away from home for the first time, which is sometimes harder on the parents than it is on the kids.  They go home on the weekend; no matter how far away they live.
	Q. At the expense of the state?
	A. Yes.
	Q. When does a student begin to learn braille?
	A. Kids start to read braille around the same time as sighted children who have a lot of experience with print before they start school through billboards and television.  Much of what they learn is through observation and experience, but blind children don't have those opportunities.  They need to learn by doing and through hands-on experience.  Learning braille is critical because you learn how to read and write yourself, and it  gives you independence.
	Q. What kind of classes are offered?
	A. Because we don't have a complete high school curriculum, about 10% of our students attend classes at Fremont Unified high schools.  We do functional academics--practical math and English.  We work a lot on social skills.  Almost 80% of what a sighted person learns socially is through vision.  So a person with visual impairment must be taught those skills--gestures and interpretation of non-verbal cues.
	Q. What kind of off-campus activity is there?
	A. Almost all of our lessons on orientation and mobility are off campus.  Once students learn their way around the campus, they learn their way around Fremont.  They're out crossing the streets, going to town.  Most of our physical education activity takes place off campus, such as horseback riding, rowing, ice-skating, wrestling, track, and goal ball which is a variant of soccer that blind people can play with a blindfolded, sighted team. 
 
 
	LEGISLATIVE UPDATE
	BARCING UP THE RIGHT TREE, Part 2

	by Dan Kysor

	As of this writing two CCB-originated pieces of legislation are heading for the governor's desk where we hope they will be signed into law.  SB858, by Senator Hughes, will put equity in existing law by including SSDI recipients in the special assistive dogfood benefits program.  The second bill, AB685, by Helen Thomson, will require all detectible warning surface products to be certified by an independent laboratory before they are sold or installed in California.  Too many detectible warning surface products are currently being installed that do not meet ADA or Title 24 regulations.  
	Our third piece of legislation, SB1242, by Deborah Ortiz, has become a 2-year bill.  
	Also going to the governor is AB422 by Darryl Steinberg.  This legislation is historic in that there is now finally a statute which requires publishers of college textbooks to make them accessible.
	AB615, by George Runner, threatens to take reader/driver funds from blind teachers and give them to local school disricts to administer as they choose.  So much opposition to the bill has been generated, however, that the bill is being put over for another year.
	CCB has been tracking many other bills.  In the next issue of the BC, we will have a complete round-up of the 1999 legislative session. 
	As I stated in Part 1 of "Barcing Up the Right Tree", it is inexcusable in this era of full employment and advanced technological opportunities that so many eligible blind and visually impaired California citizens remain out of work.  I explored the Blind Alliance for Rehabilitation Change, B.A.R.C. and its official position on this issue.  Now, in Part 2, we will focus on the Mississippi State University study as presented at the ACB convention last July in Los Angeles.  
	The study considers the influence of agency structure and of  client participation on vocational rehabilitation services and outcomes for people who are blind or visually impaired.  Brenda Cavenaugh, Ph.D., conducted an interesting study which is briefly summarized here.
	Consumers and practitioners in blindness rehabilitation support the premise that individuals who are blind or severely visually impaired have unique vocational rehabilitation (VR) needs and are best served in identifiable agencies established especially for that purpose.  The scarcity of empirically-based data supporting this position has hampered objective dialogue within the disability community regarding the continued funding of separate (blindness-only) agencies under the state-federal VR program.  
	This study investigated differences in VR service intensity (expenditures, number, and duration of services) and outcomes (competitive sector placement and earnings) of legally blind consumers in states with separate or combined (cross-disability) agencies.  The sample included 35,396 legally blind consumers closed in the 50 states by the state VR system in 1995 and 1996.  It showed that client earnings at closures were significantly higher in  separate agency states than in combined agency states and that the placement rate was significantly higher in separate agency states. 
     For more than two decades after the passage in 1920 of the first civilian vocational rehabilitation program, blind people were generally presumed unemployable by VR agencies.  With the Barden-LaFollette Act of 1943, Congress responded to the failure of VR agencies to address the rehabilitation needs of blind consumers by allowing states to designate separate state agencies to administer VR programs serving individuals who are blind or
visually impaired.  In response to questions regarding the efficacy of these agencies in serving consumers who are legally blind, findings from the current research indicate:
	1. Competitive sector placement rates are higher in separate
agency states than combined agency states (35% vs. 29%,
respectively).
	2. Client weekly earnings at closure are higher in separate agency states than in combined agency states (102.76 vs. 86.71,
respectively).
	3. There is no difference in the combined set of service variables (cost, duration, and number) across separate and combined agency states.
     Recognizing the wisdom of this study, an attempt is underway to secure for California a separate agency to administer rehabilitation services for the blind and visually impaired.  You will be hearing more about this effort at our state convention in Fresno in October and through information on the California Connection.  


	IN MEMORIAM: CHERRIE HANDY 

	by Mitch Pomerantz

	What does one say following the loss of a friend and colleague at the age of only 44 years!  Cheryl Handy (or Cherrie, as she strongly preferred) was both of those things, as well as my wife for five and a half years.  She was not the easiest person to get to know; but, once you knew her and she knew you, there was no one more loyal or supportive.
	Cherrie was a strong individual with very definite opinions and tastes.  Along with her abiding passion for fashion, Cherrie's other consuming interest was guide dogs, for she had  used a dog since her college days at California State University, Long Beach, during the mid-1970's.  She believed fervently that a guide dog offered the most effective means of mobility for the blind, and much of her life's work was devoted to this belief.  	Relatively early in her adult life, Cherrie, her husband at the time and another couple started a short-lived guide dog school in Washington State.  While ultimately unsuccessful, this dedication and commitment to her chosen cause continued to be apparent in subsequent endeavors.
	Cherrie Handy served for several years as a consumer member of the board of Guide Dogs of America (GDA).  She was elected to the Board of Directors of both Guide Dog Users of California (GDUC), and Guide Dog Users, Inc. (GDUI).  Cherrie served one term (1991-1993) as GDUC President, and two terms (1992-1996) as GDUI President.  In the latter capacity, she saw GDUI membership skyrocket to the 1,000 mark, an accomplishment of which Cherrie was especially proud.
	As GDUI President, Cherrie was instrumental in obtaining ACB's financial and organizational support to lift the 3-month quarantine restriction against guide dogs formerly imposed by Hawaii.  Through her efforts, funding was gathered from a number of sources, including several guide dog schools, hitherto unwilling to get involved in this 10-plus year struggle.  Such financial support culminated in a settlement between the plaintiffs (including Guide Dog Users, Inc.) and the State of Hawaii in April, 1998.
	On a personal note, Cherrie recognized that Hawaii's quarantine was an issue with significant ADA ramifications.  One late afternoon, I arrived home from work to her greeting: "Hi! Get on the phone and help me convince Michael Lily, the attorney handling the lawsuit, that this is an ADA case."  I did so; and after an hour of rather intense discussion, he was convinced that the quarantine could be successfully argued on ADA Title II grounds.
	At its annual convention in July, Guide Dog Users, Inc. presented the Moffitt/Gleitz Award to Cherrie Handy posthumously in recognition of her outstanding service to GDUI and her tireless commitment to the canine and human partnership.  This was particularly poignant, since her father was in attendance to accept the award.
	Cherrie Handy passed away early on the morning of June 14th, following the recurrence of the cancer which was first diagnosed and treated in 1994.  Throughout the past year, when cancer was again detected, Cherrie steadfastly believed that she could beat it, even after voluntarily choosing hospice care over further chemotherapy in April.  Approximately 50 persons participated in a "celebration of life" memorial at her apartment on June 19th.  Following her wishes, Cherrie was cremated and her ashes scattered at sea from her father's boat on June 27th.  Some 35 friends and family members attended this final tribute to her life and memory.
	Those of you who wish to honor and remember Cherrie Handy's dedication to the cause of guide dogs may do so by making a financial contribution to Guide Dog Users, Inc.  Make your check payable to GDUI and indicate in the ledger that it is for the "Cherrie Handy Memorial Fund."  Please mail your contribution to GDUI's Treasurer, Jane Sheehan, 14311 Astrodome Drive, Silver Spring, MD 20906-2245.
	Aalong with her many friends and colleagues in ACB, as well as the hundreds of guide dog users whose lives Cherrie Handy touched, I am proud and honored to have known and worked with her during an all-too-brief life.  She will be remembered both for the victory in Hawaii and the growth of the special interest affiliate she loved so much.  We shall miss Cherrie's friendship, dedication and passion tremendously in the years to come.  Farewell.  


	VOTE ON THE UNIFIED BRAILLE CODE SCHEDULED		

	Submitted by Christopher Gray

	(At the recent Board of Directors meeting of the National Braille Association, the NBA Board adopted this statement unanimously and instructed its representative to the Braille Authority of North America, Sally Herring, to act in accordance with it.)


From: Abraham Nemeth
To: the Braille-Using Community 
Subject: a Requiem for UBC

	Early next November, there will be a meeting of the International Council on English Braille (ICEB).  The principal order of business at that meeting will be to consider the adoption of the UBC.  Anyone who is concerned about the future of braille; the impact of the UBC on blind children and their teachers; its impact on transcribers and proofreaders; and, most of all, its impact on the general braille-reading public is obligated to do whatever is required to assure that the UBC, in its present state, is laid to rest.  Silence will be interpreted as acquiescence, and a posture of neutrality will inform ICEB that it has carte blanche to proceed according to plan to work its will.  
	The implications for braille of that part of the proposed UBC that has already been analyzed and distributed to the braille-using community in the various papers that I have written have been reviewed so that material is unnecessary at this time.  My observations by themselves should be sufficient to reject the UBC.  However, there are some further considerations:
	1.  The UBC is not, at this time, a code at all.  Only Committee II of the Braille Authority of North America (BANA) has completed its work of defining the base code and its extensions to mathematics and science.  According to the overall plan, there is to be a Format Committee, a Linguistics Committee, a Foreign Language Committee, a Contractions Committee, and a Rules Committee.  If these committees have functioned at all, the work of none of them has been made known.  In particular, the UBC is at this time particularly silent about how to deal with chemistry.  How can a code which is not a code be adopted when these important elements are missing?
	2.  Evaluation data were collected only for the literary part of the code.  In the United Kingdom, where braille activity is regarded to be the most intense, there were only 20 evaluators; In New Zealand, 48; in South Africa, 49; in Australia, 68 and in the United States and Canada combined, 212. 
	3.  It was part of the UBC plan to conduct a follow-up evaluation that deals with the mathematical and scientific aspects of the UBC. It appears now that the intention is to bypass this crucial step.  It is precisely here, as I have demonstrated, that the UBC cannot stand the light of day.
	4.  Despite the statistics displayed in the evaluation reports, I have, as the result of the invitations contained in my papers, received dozens of letters, all violently opposed to the UBC.  I have shared copies of these letters, and I can make them available to you for your inspection.  The signatures read like a "who's who" in the braille community.  Write to me, Dr. Abraham Nemeth, at 20764 Knob Woods, Drive, Apartment 201, Southfield, MI  48076. 
	5.  If the UBC is adopted, no thought at all has been given--and no plans have been made--for the transition from current codes.  You cannot just switch to the new code with the next book you transcribe, as is the practice when BANA makes a minor adjustment to any of the codes.  Without such plans, the transition would result in sheer chaos.
	6.  The motion to undertake the UBC project was passed by BANA in Albuquerque in 1991.  In the eight years that have ensued, the committee never gave any consideration to the Nemeth Code while actively courting the BAUK math code in the guise of independent deliberations.  Almost all transcribers who work in the Nemeth Code will tell you that if dropped numbers were permitted always, even in the literary code, the Nemeth Code would already be the unified code that we so desperately need.  The argument that dropped numbers would never be accepted by the braille-reading public is only a conjecture.  Its reality needs to be tested by an evaluation process.
	We are now at the critical juncture.  Will we allow ourselves to become the victims of naked power, or will we make our opposition strong enough to defeat the UBC?  In the end, the UBC will fall by its own weight; but that may take several years if it is adopted now.  Let us put an end to it so that we may proceed with the creative work before us.  If you miss this opportunity, you will not have another.
	Write to Phyllis Campana, BANA Chair, at the American Printing House for the Blind, 1839 Frankfort Ave., Louisville, KY 40206 or Kim Charlson, ACB BANA representative, at the American Council of the Blind, 1155 15th St. NW, Suite 720, Washington, DC 20005. 


	TECHTALK: INFORMATION MEANS POWER:
	ACCESSING CALIFORNIA LEGISLATION ON YOUR COMPUTER

	by Dan Kysor, Director of Governmental Affairs,
	California Council of the Blind
	This issue of "Techtalk" is devoted to a tutorial on accessing the California Assembly and Senate's myriad databases as well as their several real audio broadcasts.  We will deal with 4 topics: key word search, finding and retrieving a particular piece of legislation, subscribing via e-mail to a particular piece of legislation, and listening to a hearing on your computer.
	Key Word Search: One of the things I have been doing for CCB for at least three years is a key word search on the internet for any California legislation that might pertain to our interests.  I have approximately 40 key words I use in searching the large "leginfo" database.  Some of these words are: disabled, handicapped, blind, ssi/ssp, visually impaired--well, you get the idea.
	Step 1: Point your browser to www.leginfo.ca.gov.  In ordinary English this means that in whatever program you are using to access the web, type the address of the web site you wish to view.  Generally after each step, you must press the Enter key.  Step 2: Tab or arrow down to Key Word Search.  Step 3: Type your key words--Example: blind, disabled, ssi/ssp, guide dog.  Step 4: Tab or arrow down to Search.  You will then get a list of legislation pertaining to the above key words; and if you search at this writing, you will probably see only one bill that has all these words in it, our SB858 by Senator Teresa Hughes.
	Finding and Retrieving a Piece of Legislation: Step 1: Point your browser to www.leginfo.ca.gov.  Step 2: Tab or arrow down to Bill Information.  Step 3: Tab or arrow down to Bill Number and type the bill number.  You will most likely get a list of two bills, an Senate bill and a Senate bill with the same number, but one with an AB before the number and the other with an SB. 
	Subscribing Via E-mail to a Piece of Legislation: Subscribing to a bill has many advantages because you will find out everything that happens to it along its course from house to house.  You also will get any amendments (changes to the bill) automatically.
	Step 1: Send e-mail to: Senate-news@sen.ca.gov.  the subject field is ignored.  In the body of the message type: subscribe sb_858 or whatever bill you want in either house of the legislature.  (Notice that the character after SB is the underline.) 
	Listening to a Hearing on Your Computer: Not all hearing rooms are wired live to the internet but many are--like the SSenateenate's room 4202 and the Senate's room 4203, for instance.  You can also listen to the floor sessions which are usually restricted to the public.  You must have the Real Audio Player already installed on your computer for this to work. Step 1: Point your browser to www.sen.ca.gov.  Tab or arrow down to Tv-Audio and simply pick the room you want to hear.  
	Well there you have it--probably more than you ever wanted to know--but don't you feel more powerful now?
 

	THE HISTORY OF ORIENTATION AND MOBILITY, Part 2

	(Editor's note: This material continues the article from the Summer issue of The Blind Californian.  It is reprinted with permission by the Blinded Veterans of America.) 		
	In our last segment, Richard Hoover had won approval of his idea for Mobility training for the blinded troops sent to Valley Forge.  The hospital itself was the initial setting for lessons, the first six without a cane; the next 16 were with one.  This setting provided a challenge to the pupil and in Hoover's words, "yet not so difficult to invite defeat in the very beginning."  The next nine lessons were taught downtown.  Successful completion brought the pupil a furlough.  No mention of remedial training is made, but it is logical to assume it was available.  	The gift of Valley Forge goes deeper than just cane technique.  It is a comprehensive system that includes the traveler orienting himself and protecting himself even when a cane is not used.  Hoover's protection system is the forerunner of the current Upper Protective Technique.  The cane techniques taught by Hoover are almost identical to their successors today, the Touch Technique and Diagonal Technique.  Hoover's two true innovations are the length of the cane and touching it in front of the foot about to step instead of the traditional cane and step on the same side.  The cane itself had been a limiting factor.  Hoover's outdoor method (Touch Technique) called for an extended cane to follow the principle of cane tip forward suggested by Levy.  The added length allowed a safety margin in searching for curbs, obstacles and dropoffs.  Wooden canes proved undesirable.  
	In 1945, 300 aluminum canes weighing between 6 and 8 ounces each were obtained.  All were a standard length of 45 inches.  (Editor's Note: Aluminum was used in production of airplanes; diversion of this for cane making was a major coup of the time and shows the emphasis given the rehabilitation effort.)  With the approval of Hoover's mobility plan Colonel Beeuwkes had also agreed to the screening of additional staff as orientors.  The initial Army move to establish Valley Forge and Dibble as blind rehabilitation centers brought experienced staff, but now Orientors had to be recruited, screened and trained.  
	In recalling the selection process, Hoover describes the following: "It has been said that the patients were allowed months to learn their basic skills.  Such was not the case, however, with their instructors, who had to produce or be disqualified within a few short weeks."  
	A staff of 50 was eventually selected.  The peak load at Valley Forge was estimated at about 360 pupils.  Their actual screening method was not recorded by Hoover; but by the time they arrived for screening, Hoover had developed his Long Cane techniques and was experimenting with them under blindfold.  Performance under blindfold seems to have been one of the standards required.  
	Hoover was released from active duty as a First Lieutenant at the beginning of 1947.  The VA had approved the opening of Hines on July 12, 1946.  The program would not actually begin until July 4, 1948.  Hoover was repeatedly offered the position of being in charge of the Blind Rehabilitation Program at Hines.  He refused repeatedly.  Instead, he entered Johns Hopkins Medical School and eventually became an Ophthalmologist.  He stated, "I think the best thing you can do for the blind is make them see."  He was, however, in an unprecedented move, made a consultant to the VA Department of Medicine and Surgery while still a medical student.  
	Warren Bledsoe filled the position at Hines which Hoover declined on an interim basis.  Later the position would be filled by Russell Williams.  Hoover did not abandon mobility.  He continued to teach orientation classes while in medical school and residing at the Maryland School for the Blind.  He taught students and members from various agencies servicing the blind community.  
	Why was Hoover so concerned to teach orientation?  Hoover had been trained to work with the blind, and worked at the Maryland School for the Blind before the war.  He offered these thoughts in 1947:  "Individuals also become functionally deficient to a certain degree when encountering a more intricate and complex environment.  So most of us go out to seek training and education to cope with new situations and lend ourselves pliable to these many situations arising in the competitive world." 
	Hoover goes on to compare Orientation to Plato's ideal concept of education, which is achievement of all one is capable of.  "So, consider, now, how paramount it is to give an education which establishes an intelligently functioning sensory and motor whole which cannot be produced in part and aims at the ultimate in education of which Plato spoke.  Surely walking without a guide would fall into this category besides its being a necessity, a joy, a right and a privilege." 
	At Valley Forge the population was naturally servicemen.  After the war, controversy existed over who could benefit from Hoover's program.  The Army had dealt with once-sighted male adults, who at the very least had previously been sighted, and in excellent health.  None had been congenitally blind; none had 
been over sixty.  Hoover (1947) clearly addresses what he thinks is the potential target population for training: "... this speaker believes the time to begin orientation and travel is at the earliest possible moment.  In the case of the infant, the free use of the upper and lower extremities should be encouraged with authoritative training beginning with creeping movements and progressively continued and adapted throughout school years.  For those losing sight at a later age, the hospital is the place to start orientation and travel, and it should be continued until the individual is independent and satisfied.  There is no limit as to age, but here again, anyone entertaining the foolish notion that absolutely everyone should learn to travel should erase such a wild idea immediately.  There are just as many in comparison, no doubt, not mentally or physically prepared for such an event as there are those of us not adequately suited for flying a PSG."  (Editor's Note: It is important to consider the time that this statement was made; and the fact that little in the way of blind rehabilitation was being done with multiply involved individuals.  This 1947 reference is the only time Hoover expressed his thoughts on this topic in writing; he did write other articles on establishment of the Valley Forge program.)  Seeing a blind person traveling with the aid of a cane may or may not be an everyday sight for everyone, but it has certainly become a common one in our society.  It seems incomprehensible today to fathom what all the resistance to teaching travel skills was about.  At the very least, one would reason that independent cane travel was worth trying.  
	Why was there so much bias about the idea of a person with a cane?  Art often mirrors and colors the impression of the viewer and society in general.  The art with blind persons as subjects in western culture has often represented them as pitiful, tattered beggars, often holding a cane.  This idea certainly did not escape Pearson, as shown earlier.  Rembrandt's Tobias shows a blind man reaching out, groping as if completely, hopelessly lost.  Beallange shows a blind man, staff raised to heaven, speaking or questioning.  Lagendyk and Parry each did poignant portrayals of blind beggars with canes.  Perhaps the idea met with the same inertia all new ideas first meet.  Hoover shares this recollection of one visitor: 
	"We had a number of prominent visitors.  One outstanding educator of the blind, himself sighted, seemed the epitome of mental blindness one day when he was supposed to be observing a lesson in foot travel and spent most of his time with his back to the instructor and blind soldier, giving a long lecture to his host on what a mess the Army was making of its program for the blind."  
	The position of the Army is very hard to define.  Colonel Greear was supportive of Hoover and writes praises of the Orientation Program in his 1946 article.  Curiously, in an article published in May, 1944, in the same magazine, Outlook for the Blind, he fails to mention anything about Hoover or orientation.  It is easy to suppose that the program really did not bear fruit until 1943.  This is true, but in the 1946 article Hoover is not mentioned either.  There is only a reference to a highly qualified enlisted man who was later commissioned and in charge of the physical reconditioning program, which included Orientation.  The person is Hoover.  
	Few people are mentioned by name in the article, but there is another incident involving the Army and Hoover.  Hoover addressed the American Association of Instructors of the Blind, 38th Stated Meeting, held at Perkins School, June 24-28, 1946.  When the proceedings were published after the meeting, Hoover is listed as Lt. Richard E. Hoover.  His November article in Outlook for the Blind fails to carry his military rank, though he was still on active duty at the time of print.  
	But why should people in the Army, or anyone else for that matter, be negative on cane use?  World War II provided dazzling scientific breakthroughs.  Sonar and radar were perfected.  The jet engine was invented and atomic power introduced.  In comparison to these great scientific strides, and those that have subsequently followed, the Long Cane or guide dog might seem primitive.  
	Also, there is the desire to make the blind individual undetectable to the general public while traveling.  When considered from this standpoint, independent travel is no longer the issue.  Facial Perception, the magic sixth sense, seemed to be the main competition to Long Cane travel.  The idea of
something natural, internal, replacing sight is very appealing.  Levy, Pearson, and Hoover, though the last was somewhat skeptical, mention it.  Today we know it is based on hearing.  	Ironically, in an obscure article titled, "Can Orientation Be Taught Blind Students?" published in the March, 1945, edition of Outlook for the Blind, Toger Lien comes to that conclusion.  After experiment he states: "From this I concluded that ability to detect obstacles was centered in the ear and that the facial sensations were only secondary effect.  Perhaps the inertia to this idea is similar to the inertia facing Long Cane use at the time." 
	Why did Orientation work at Valley Forge?  They had the right clients, people who had once been independent and wanted to be independent again.  They had the right instructors; the Army had taken a new generation willing to break from tradition.  They had the right cane; the 6 to 8 ounce Long Cane was vital.  They had the right method.  Levy, Robinson and St.  Dunstan's had greatly influenced Hoover, but his idea of projecting the cane to the side of the following step was purely his own.  And finally, they had Richard Hoover.
	Bledsoe offers this assessment: "Other hospitals had somewhat similar resources, but did not have Hoover.  He found a way not only to get the right men together to teach soldiers, but knew how to handle both patients and how to get the best out of them." 
	(Editor's Note: The "History of O&M" is a six-part series which appeared in the BVA Bulletin throughout 1997.  Thanks go to Bob Kozel, the VISTA Coordinator in San Diego, for researching and writing this material.) 


	SCHOLARSHIP COMMITTEE REPORT

               by Al Biegler, Chair of the Scholarship Committee

     On Saturday August 14, 1999, at 10 AM, the Scholarship Committee met at the CCB office in Hayward to choose this year's scholarship winners.  It was a very good meeting with many well written letters to help us make our determinations.  Following is the list of students who received scholarships:
     The Anthony Mannino Fund Scholarships went to Hesham Kamel, Yorba Linda; major: computer science; and to Mehnati Mansoor, Fresno; major: health science.
     The Lilly Perry Foundation Scholarships went to Jacob Parham Mastour, Los Angeles; major: design; Tiffany Marie Medina, Los  Altos; major: English literature;  Peggy A. Washington, Oakland; major: psychology; and Naoko Yoshino, La Mesa; major: linguistics.
     A portion of this award came from Philip Halford, a member of the Scholarship Committee. It was received by Michelle Renee Bruns, Chula Vista; major: social work.
     A portion of this Award came from the Braille Revival League
of California going to Rafael Ramirez, Huntington Park; major: marriage, family therapy.
     CCB Scholarships were awarded to: 
*  Jennifer Lynn Benson, Brawley; major: special education 
*  Johnny Bolagh, Santa Fe Springs; major: mathematics
*  Diana Lin Edwards, Eureka; major: AS computer literacy
*  Jacqueling T. El-Azzi, Long Beach; major: vocational rehabilitation
*  Daniel Charles Flowers, Spring Valley; major: graphic design
*  Deborah Lynn Flowers, Corning, major: rehabilitation counselor
*  Gabriel Gregg Griffith, Lodi; major: communications 
*  Diane Lesley Gunterman, Rancho Cucamonga; major: psychology
*  Peter J. Ince, Berkeley; major: entertainment law
*  Quency Joiner, Sacramento; major: computer information systems
*  Marin A. Kopel, Sherman Oaks; major: executive MBA
*  Cheryl Louise Le Valley, Eureka; major: social work
*  Jesus Perez, Los Angeles; major: vocational rehabilitation 
*  Richard Anthony Rueda. Alhambra; major: rehabilitation counselor
*  Maria Isabel Sandoval, Santa Ana; major: occupational therapy
*  Ricardo Valenzuela, Los Angeles; major: business applications
     The Scholarship Committee consisted of Al Biegler chair, Vincent Caldron, Coletta Davis, Philip Halford, Dr. Martin Jones, Pat La France, Josie Mc Kinney and Abby Vincent.
     The total scholarship money awarded was $28,000.
     Here is a little advice for anyone applying for a scholarship in the future.  Please answer the questions to the best of your ability.  When you answer questions such as: "high school attended? colleges attended?" by writing n/a, (not applicable), the members of the committee cannot determine if you are in the lower division, upper division, or graduate division.  Your help is necessary if we are to make appropriate decisions.
     I wish to thank President Catherine Skivers, her sons Eric and Darryl, Larry Seiber, Dorothy Vallerga, and Joann Biegler for their help.
      

	A SHARING OF IDEAS

	by Jeff Thom

	"'Tis better to have tried and failed than never to have tried at all."  In the spirit of this modified adage, I am embarking on the submission of a column for this venerable publication.  As you will see, however, the resounding success or crushing failure of this venture will primarily be in your hand--the hands of our readers. 
	Under the leadership of President Skivers, the financial condition of the California Council of the Blind is better than in many years.  In addition, membership in CCB is beginning to grow in many areas of the state.  Moreover, our advocacy efforts in a number of areas are starting to pay big dividends.  	Nonetheless, there is no such thing as a perfect organization, and obviously the CCB has a lot of room for improvement.  Members have sometimes expressed the view that the organization needs to accomplish more or that they just don't feel thrilled by what the Council is doing.  On the other hand, I receive very few calls from members suggesting improvements.  In order for the CCB to achieve anywhere near its optimal potential, officers, board members, chapter presidents, and individual members must all demonstrate a commitment to work both hard and cooperatively.  
	On the last day of our Spring Convention, President Skivers set aside a period of time in which members could discuss their ideas for improving the organization, and especially CCB conventions.  I was extremely proud of this interchange and resolved to initiate this column to be a forum on ways in which the CCB can become a better organization.  Although I probably will not be able to resist the opportunity to inject my own opinions into the column, I will, I hope, be true to the mission of reflecting the diverse viewpoints which are represented in our organization. 
	It is my hope that the column can address issues such as improvement of the convention process; communication between CCB policy makers and the rank and file; services the CCB either should be providing but isn't, or that need to be improved; methods for increasing membership; and the use and composition of committees.  
	I will promise, however, that without membership input, I will not waste your time producing a column that would contain little more than my pompous pronouncements on the changes this organization should consider.  I have a sufficiently levelheaded opinion of my own abilities to know that I would achieve little more than presenting you with an article worth skipping.  
	If you feel that this type of column should be written and you don't mind entrusting me with this task, please telephone or 
mail, in any format, your constructive suggestions to me.  My  address and phone are as follows: 7414 Mooncrest Way, Sacramento, CA 95831; 916-429-8201.  For those who would prefer e-mail, the CCB office will provide you with my address.  


	AROUND THE STATE 	

	Earlier this year the San Bernardino Chapter of the CCB held an essay contest for blind and visually impaired students from 7th to 12th grades.  Since the first prize was a free trip to Space Camp for one week, the essay had to be written on why the student wished to attend Space Camp, what he or she expected to gain from the experience, and how the knowledge acquired would help in plans for the future.  The San Bernardino Chapter promised to pay the $500 tuition and provide round-trip air fare for the student, but the parents were to be responsible for any spending money the student might need.  We are proud to announce that the winner is Eric Baldwin, aged 13, who wrote a fine essay expressing his interest in the space programs and in flying.  Eric has Strargaarts disease and lives in Palo Cedro, California.  His appointment at Space Camp is September 25-30 and we hope he has a wonderful time.  

*****          *****          *****          *****
	California Council of Citizens with Low Vision (CCCLV) had a busy spring convention program in Sacramento.  Women's Concerns joined CCCLV on Thursday afternoon to hear a presentation by Barbara Morgan, an author, award winning cook, and innovative traveler, along with being Dan Kysor's mother.  Her remarks generated empathy and motivation.
	The Friday morning session featured the Committee on Access and Transportation.  Gene Lozano arranged for an ADA trainer to speak about Titles II and III of the Act.  Additionally, via conference telephone, people were able to provide input to Jim Abrams from the California Hotel/Motel Industry about what were the most commonsense solutions for easier access.  	
	Following the Committee for Senior Blind program on Saturday morning, CCCLV members heard a legislative update from Dan Kysor; and Assemblywoman Sheila Kuehl's staffer, Carol Wallisch, explained AB368, which would classify low vision devices as prosthetic by definition for coverage under Medi-Cal and HMO's in California.
	CCCLV Treasurer Coletta Davis is now accepting dues of $10 for 2000.  Membership brings subscriptions to The CCCLV Chronicle, Vision Access, and The Braille Forum.  Send check or  money order payable to CCCLV to:  Coletta Davis, 2879 East Alden Place, Anaheim, CA 92806.  		Your membership is needed to help continue providing programs of interest to persons living with low vision.  Please join us and bring a friend.  
	Coming attractions for the Fall, 1999, convention in Fresno are a visit from a long-time member, Jan Carmichael, who is Executive Director of CIL-Fresno;  a panel of low vision specialists; an opportunity to learn about sunglasses; a continuation of the discussion on hotel/motel accessibility for persons with visual impairment; and news of legislative developments from our own Dan Kysor, as well as the new Executive Director of ACB, Charlie Crawford. 

Bernice Kandarian, President


*****          *****          *****          *****          *****
	The Braille Revival League of California will hold its business meeting at 9 AM on October 29 at the Radisson Hotel in Fresno; and at 10, the joint program of BRLC and the Library Users of America will begin.  The speaker will be Christopher Gray who will discuss the International Conference on English Braille (ICEB) which he will attend in early November in Baltimore where a crucial vote on the unified braille code is scheduled.
	At 10:45 The LUA program will begin with a representative from the Fresno Public Library to talk about accessibility issues there and one from the Fresno Subregional Library which serves the blind and visually impaired.  
	Following the program there will be the usual luncheon with a brief LUA business meeting and then the opportunity for all guests to talk about the books they have read recently, the readers they have enjoyed, and other issues pertaining to libraries that distribute braille and recorded books.    

Al Biegler, BRLC President, and Leslie Thom, CALUA President


	CCB OFFICERS

President:  Catherine Skivers, 836 Resota Street, Hayward, CA 94545

First Vice President: Charles Nabarrete, 239 N. Walnut Haven Drive, West Covina 91790 

Second Vice President: Jeff Thom, 7414 Mooncrest Drive, Sacramento, CA 95831 

Secretary:  Kenneth Frasse, 141 Del Medio Ave., Apt. 223, Mountain View, CA 94040

Treasurer:  David Parker, 1600 Florida Street, Vallejo, CA 94590 

	CCB BOARD OF DIRECTORS 

Dr. Martin Jones, San Francisco
Jane Kardas, Ukiah 
Rhonda King, San Bernardino 
Patricia LaFrance, Temple City
Peter Pardini, Mill Valley
Roger Petersen, Mountain View
Mitch Pomerantz, Los Angeles 
Ahmad Rahman, Carson
Eugene Lozano, Sacramento  

	----------------

	CCB PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE



Joan Black, Chair: 4925 Coke Ave., Lakewood, CA 90712; 	562-630-2304



Winifred Downing: 1587 38th Ave., San Francisco, CA 94122; 		
415-564-5798

Brian Hall: 5722 Abraham Ave., Westminster, CA 92683; 714-894-3497 

Bernice Kandarian, Vice Chair: 	2211 Latham St. #120	, Mountain 	       View, CA 94040; 650-969-1688

Maria Lopez: 3925 E. 6th St., Los Angeles, CA 90023; 213-268-4526

Daveed Mandell: 1981 Francisco, #7A, Berkeley, CA 94709-2105; 
510-665-9260



Catherine Schmitt: 348 S. Prospectors Road, 	#9, 	Diamond Bar, CA 91765 909-861-1653

Connie Skeen: 3250 Maple Ave., Oakland, CA 94602; 510-532-7687

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