The House Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch marked up its funding bill today. Their recommendation to the full Committee on Appropriations will include $7.5 million to the Library of Congress for the implementation of the digital talking book program by NLS. This is less than half of the amount requested by NLS. The subcommittee chair, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, (d-fl) stated that the bill will also include language giving the Librarian discretion to move some funds from other sources if it is deemed appropriate to fund this program. However, it is not clear whether this discretion would also allow the Librarian to take funds from NLS to fund something else. As of this writing, the actual legislative language is not available, but this is a question we will have to look into.
The full Appropriations Committee will probably consider this bill within a week or so. That means we have some work to do. Members of Congress, especially House members on the Appropriations Committee, need to know how important the talking book program is to the blind community. Please contact your representative if you have not already done so. The transition to digital talking books is not just a nice thing to do to provide more bells and whistles that appeal to techies. It is a necessity because the cassette players currently in use are no longer being manufactured. The entire industry is phasing out the cassette. It is only a matter of time before something has to be done anyway that will enable NLS to adapt to industry trends. Please help us support the continued availability of talking books for the blind. If you have any questions, please contact me either by email, or by calling the ACB national office.