Things have been very busy in the last few weeks for everyone at home and here in Washington DC. In addition to the currency case, ACB has been involved in a number of initiatives to improve quality of life, equality of opportunity and independence of all people with visual impairments. This Update, I hope will provide a summary of a few of these events (I have about a dozen more).
As you may know, SSI provides a modest stipend to help keep elderly, disabled, and blind individuals, from falling too deeply into poverty. This stipend is also available, although in a more restricted fashion to refugees, asylees and other humanitarian migrants contingent on their becoming citizens. However, because of delays in the immigration system beyond their control and difficulty learning English, this has resulted in over 6,000 elderly and disabled refugees losing this essential life-sustaining benefit.
The Social Security Administration currently projects that over 40,000 of these refugees will face extreme hardship and destitution due to the suspension of their SSI benefits over the next ten years. These are people who fled persecution or torture in countries such as Iran, Russia, Iraq, Vietnam and Somalia, and now are too elderly or disabled to support themselves.
ACB tries to stay involved in issues large and small that can help people who are blind and visually impaired. As such, ACB has supported passage of legislation that would allow these individuals to receive a life-sustaining benefit for an additional two years while they go through the process of becoming a United States citizen.
Because the initial intent was to add this language to an appropriations bill and instead Congress saw fit to institute a long-term continuing resolution, it will be necessary to bring forth this issue next year.
Over the past year ACB has taken an active role in emergency preparedness on a national scale, obviously with an emphasis on people with visual impairments. This has included the publication of two pamphlets: Emergency Preparedness for People with Visual Impairments; and Emergency Preparedness for your Service Animal or Pet; and presentations on this issue across the country, and on numerous radio programs. ACB also has worked closely with the Interagency Coordinating Committee on Emergency Preparedness, the Red Cross and others to address this issue. ACB was pleased to be able to present at a critical Emergency Preparedness and Response Conference sponsored by Government Horizons and Homeland Defense Journal on the issue “Early Warnings and Communication.” It is my intent to include information from the presentation and the conference itself in upcoming Updates.
Although, there is not much to say at this point, ACB has been involved in meetings with the Department of Homeland Security, Red Cross and Senate and House Committee staffers on the issue of emergency preparedness and the lack of communication with FEMA on disability issues and ongoing concern that the needs of people with disabilities have not and will not be met during a disaster.
Elections have passed and everything went well…we hope. However, in Congress things have been moving. Democratic members of Congress have been particularly concerned with questions of voting machine security and two erroneous articles in the New York Times and the Washington Post stating that machines would be de-certified have only made things more unstable. There have been a number of meetings on the Hill and ACB is currently working to help draft a letter.
Currently, there are the beginnings of a concerted push for a Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT). Although, the idea of a paper audit trail doesn’t sound too intimidating, it could be perceived as the beginnings of a slippery slope. HAVA basically states that if something is a part of the voting process then it is required that we, as blind people, should be able to access it. This VVPAT is not just a “paper trail.” The “Voter Verified” part of VVPAT means that the individual voting has the right and responsibility to make sure their vote was recorded accurately by (All caps) CHECKING THE PAPER VERSION. The question is - how can blind people check the paper?
Day Al-Mohamed
Director of Advocacy and Governmental Affairs
American Council of the Blind
1155 15th St. NW
Washington DC 20005
Tel. 202-467-5081
dalmohamed@acb.org