by Michael Byington
On April 15, 2000 the board of directors of National Industries for the Blind (NIB) adopted the following position: “National Industries for the Blind endorses, promotes, and encourages the payment of at least the federal minimum wage for all employees whose only disability is blindness in a manner that will not jeopardize employment opportunities.”
On the same date, the General Council of Industries for the Blind (GCIB) refused to endorse this position, when it tabled, indefinitely, adoption of a position paper which stated in part, “The General Council of Industries for the Blind endorses the payment of the federal minimum wage to all legally blind employees whose earnings capacity is not impaired by additional disabling conditions.”
This action — or more specifically, lack thereof — may have disastrous consequences for all the blind workers in the NIB/GCIB system, and threaten the existence of the Javits-Wagner-O’Day Act (JWOD).
For those of you who may not be familiar with the industries for the blind structure in America, I want to explain that NIB is a legally recognized non-profit entity which helps industries for the blind programs to get contracts for work under JWOD. GCIB is the council representing the various blind industries throughout America. To simplify even further, NIB is like the franchiser, and GCIB represents all the individual franchisees.
When I attended the GCIB meeting where the minimum wage issue was tabled, I was there representing my employer, Envision, whose president and CEO, Linda Merrill, had expressed this position on the question of minimum wages for blind-only employees, “Envision is in support of paying people, with blindness only, the minimum wage.”
Merrill had also noted, however, that GCIB member agencies are regulated in matters of wages by the Fair Labor Standards Act, and not by NIB or GCIB. Therefore, under current law, NIB or GCIB cannot legally compel affiliates or members to comply with whatever position either organization takes.
Nonetheless, I will acknowledge my personal bias: I was at the meeting with directions from my superior to vote favorably on the GCIB minimum wage issue. I was pleased to be doing so because my employer’s position on the matter happens to match my own view — as well as that of a number of other national blindness advocacy organizations.
The American Council of the Blind (ACB) has been on record on the minimum wage issue since passing the 1986 Resolution 86-04, which states in part, “This organization urges that all individuals who do not have a documented secondary physical, mental or emotional disability should receive at least the statutory minimum wage.” Resolution 89-23 further documents this as ACB’s position.
The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) has introduced legislation which would attempt to codify in law what is essentially the ACB position. This legislation, however, is poorly drafted and needs some clean-up amendments in order to achieve its intent.
Although the newly adopted NIB position, as well as the GCIB position statement which was tabled, and the ACB resolutions, Merrill’s statement of the Envision position, and the intent of the NFB-sponsored legislation all come down on essentially the same side of the sub-minimum wage issue, I am not providing this analysis with the intent of providing any further interpretation of the ACB resolutions on the subject. Nor am I writing to clarify the position which my employer has stated so succinctly. Needless to say, NFB has not authorized me to speak for them, nor am I part of the NIB board. The analysis I provide herein is strictly my own. I write because I want to share with the GCIB and others my perception of the ramifications of GCIB’s refusal to embrace a policy which has been endorsed by so many other individuals and organizations.
First of all, I need to set the stage for what GCIB did. The position paper under consideration had been written by a committee of GCIB members, and adopted by GCIB’s Executive Committee on a close vote. It was a controversial issue, and much political wrangling and deal-making had taken place prior to the discussion and vote. At the time of the vote, an amendment was placed on the floor by a member who had actually spoken against the proposal.
This amendment would have expanded and strengthened the proposal to say that all blind people should receive the federal minimum wage — with no comment being made on possible exceptions for people whose earnings capacity is impaired by disabling conditions in addition to blindness. Before this amendment could be voted upon, and after limited discussion of the amendment, a motion to table the main motion and proposed amendment was made, took precedence, and the entire subject of the position paper was tabled, non-time specific.
Although there is no way to prove it, I believe the votes were present on the GCIB floor to adopt the originally proposed position paper, and bring GCIB into line with the stated position of other organizations. The vote would have been very close. I believe that the strengthening amendment was a clever ploy to confuse the issues and insure that the motion to table would pass.
My readers may wonder what could possibly be wrong with the strengthening amendment. On the surface, it sounds like a good idea. Why should other disabilities aside from blindness be allowed to potentially restrict one’s eligibility to earn minimum wage if blindness no longer causes such restrictions? The answer lies in the very severe nature of the kinds of multiple disabilities which sometimes accompany blindness.
In recent years, many large institutions which formerly provided residential care to multiply disabled people have been dramatically downsized, and some have closed. This situation has resulted in the need for day placements for many severely disabled people. These individuals are sometimes not toilet trained and often have no functional use of language whatsoever. A number of NIB-affiliated GCIB members are establishing programming so they can accommodate placements of this growing subset of the blindness population. This is commendable. Blind multiply disabled individuals are usually the last to come out of institutional settings, and when placed in generic agencies serving the severely disabled, such individuals often receive inadequate programming which can result in profound isolation because generic programs generally do not know how to deal with the involvement of blindness as a part of the overall multiple disability lexicon.
Because of their collective experience in working with people who are blind and their understanding of the ramifications of visual impairments, the NIB/GCIB entities probably represent the best chance for success in improving the quality of life for this population, but they cannot afford to do so if they must call the day activities they administer for their multiply disabled blind consumers “work” and pay minimum wage for them.
There were GCIB members at the meeting who maintained that it would be discriminatory to suggest that blindness alone should not prevent blind people from earning minimum wage while maintaining that the presence of other disabilities may, in fact, be justification enough for paying less than a minimum wage. William Thompson, president of GCIB, was one member who expressed this view. In a conversation with this observer after the vote, Thompson said, “This was very difficult. Many of my closest friends and people whom I hold in high respect were on the other side of this issue. I believe, however, very sincerely, that if we say that all blind only people should have minimum wage but that it is not required for blind people with other disabilities, we are discriminating against other disabilities. Other disability organizations would ridicule us a great deal, and with good reason.”
I, on the other hand, counter that factual statements do not, in themselves, discriminate. It is a fact that some other disabilities or combinations of disabilities do indeed prevent a person from working at competitive levels.
Yet, long experience has taught us that with the right technology, rehabilitation engineering, and training in the skills of blindness, blind people need not be less than competitive. What GCIB has done through its tabling action is to state that because some multiply disabled blind people cannot earn minimum wage, other blind only people should be legally held to the same sub-minimum restrictions.
There was no need for GCIB to take this posture. A recent NIB study revealed that fewer than 200 blind only individuals are working for sub-minimum wage in NIB/GCIB facilities throughout the country. The economic impact of embracing minimum wage standards for blind only employees would, therefore, have been negligible.
The NFB legislation on minimum wage will probably not be adopted in its current form. It will, however, generate lots of notice and probably generate Congressional hearings. The resulting high profile of the issue increases the likelihood that some advocacy organization will attempt to open up the JWOD Act to Congressional scrutiny. Should this happen, there will be considerable risks for industries programs. JWOD could certainly stand strengthening in the areas of acquisition of contracts for products, procurement priorities, and enforcement; it would be wonderful if such things could be added to the act, but there is also a strong segment within the independent living movement which has widely advocated doing away with JWOD as we know it. These groups propose to simply replace JWOD by giving more perks, contracts, and tax breaks to private industry to encourage employment of all disabled people, and to use former JWOD administrative monies to give more job coaching and supported employment funds to centers for independent living.
There is also a lobbying group of small business advocates who are advocating for the repeal of JWOD altogether. These entities also claim that they would be glad to employ more disabled people if JWOD were to go away, but they really do not advocate replacing JWOD with anything specific. If either of these scenarios occurs, the result could be the loss of 5,000 to 6,000 good jobs held by blind Americans.
By avoiding the sub-minimum wage issue with its irresponsible tabling action, GCIB may have gravely endangered employment programs for blind Americans. It has forfeited what could have been a fully participatory seat at the table as other blindness advocacy groups wrangle over the best means to achieve the goal of minimum wage for all blind only employees in America. GCIB has taken this great risk over fewer than 200 employees nationwide who are not being provided with minimum wage.
If GCIB acts promptly, there may still be time for it to remove its position paper from the table and codify it as the group’s official position. This needs to happen, however, by no later than GCIB’s next regular business meeting, which will take place in October.