by Michael Byington
Kansas has never had a freestanding commission for the blind. Its blind services have always been a part of a larger umbrella system.
This article is about a battle for a commission for the blind where I will discuss some of the casualties and the spilled blood. My hope is that other states can learn from our experiences. There are many classes to take at the school of hard knocks on the way to a commission, and perhaps our story will help other states quiz out of some of them.
When blind services were originally established in Kansas in the 1930s, there was reasonable autonomy for the unit within the agency umbrella. Blind services submitted its own budget, and the unit included counselors, social workers, and teachers who specialized in the field of blindness. In addition, there were units to cover such areas as prevention of blindness, restoration of sight, and provision of braille, as well as the traditional vocational services.
Over the past 25 years, we have seen the umbrella structure gain size and strength. With each gain in strength for the bureaucracy, blind services has lost a little more control and autonomy.
In the past three years, Kansans have seen the destruction of increasing numbers of categorical and specialized services for the blind. Here is a partial list of what has been lost.
Kansas Industries for the Blind, a state-operated industrial program for the blind which was paying competitive wages and benefits to its blind workers, and which was operating financially at a break-even level, was closed. The bureaucrats at the top of the umbrella did not think the industries program reflected “their philosophy of community integration.”
Individual caseload budgetary authority for blind services was lost, as separate storage and record-keeping on blind cases were eliminated. The separate blind services field program was completely abolished, as blind services counselors and teachers became part of the general vocational rehabilitation program. In many areas caseloads are now being blended. Several areas of the state have no rehabilitation teachers for the blind available at all because office area-maps have been redrawn. (The social work positions had disappeared several years ago, and prevention of blindness and restoration of sight programs had also been moved to general medical services. Today, these services do not exist as identifiable entities.)
The generalists’ umbrella agency also proposed to close the Kansas rehabilitation center for the blind last year. A lawsuit filed by the Kansas ACB affiliate, and a lot of lobbying on the part of blind citizens, prevented this closure, but, despite our efforts, the rehabilitation center has been relocated to less valuable real estate. The center is now in a beautifully remodeled building in a relatively remote location, where there is nothing blind rehab clients can walk to in the surrounding community. Only the training building has been relocated. Plans for replacement of a residential facility, which had been part of the program for many years, remain uncertain.
In past years, the Kansas NFB and ACB affiliates have introduced into the Kansas legislature their own versions of commission for the blind bills, and for many years one organization would make sure the other’s proposals went nowhere. In the past three years, however, things had gotten so bad that the leadership of both organizations realized it was time to work together. We are therefore united on a commission proposal and we pushed aggressively for it during this year’s legislative session. Envision, a private, non-profit affiliate of National Industries for the Blind (NIB) also joined the consumer groups in full support of the commission proposal. Until recently, I was employed as Envision’s Director of Governmental Affairs. This was a systems advocacy position, so I had the honor of leading the charge on Envision’s behalf.
We did not get our commission proposal passed even through one house of our legislature, but we did manage to get a recommendation for interim study of the way blind Kansans have been treated by our umbrella agency. The study is to include consideration of creating a freestanding commission operated by blind citizens and experts in blindness. This is further than the commission concept has ever gotten before in the state of Kansas.
Back when the blindness organizations in Kansas were still beating each other up over the details of commission bills, and it was clear to most onlookers that efforts were going nowhere, the leadership of our umbrella agency used to watch the processes with a certain tongue in cheek amusement. Cock fighting or Texas death wrestling matches are not legal in Kansas, but watching the “blind battles” was said to be a favored spectator sport of the umbrella generalists.
When the blind consumer organizations got together on a commission proposal, and then enlisted the help of Envision, a financially sound organization which had a full-time lobbyist at the state capitol, all of a sudden those ineffective blind combatants apparently ceased to be so entertaining. The proponents of fully integrated services had to find a new way to attempt to silence the unified blind.
The alliance between the state NFB and ACB affiliates on the commission bill was rock solid. No chinks could be found in that armor. Envision’s support and assistance therefore turned out to be the most vulnerable link in the determined chain.
Now the story becomes a little more personal for your author. I was, after all, the Envision staffer doing most of the work on the commission advocacy, and on attempting to get lost services restored.
On March 12, 2001, nine ACB members accompanied me to a House Social Services Budget Committee meeting. I testified for Envision and David Schwinn, a member of the ACB affiliate’s legislative committee, also testified. This was the meeting which resulted in the recommendation for an interim study.
On March 13, 2001, my former boss had a meeting with some high-level Kansas government officials. For obvious reasons, my boss has not identified the officials. It was after all a closed-door meeting with no records kept. She cannot prove what was implied or said. The impression she left with, however, was that if Envision did not stop causing trouble over the commission bill and the restoration of categorical services for people who are blind, Envision would get no additional state business and might well lose much of the state business it currently has.
Envision has around 25 blind employees who work exclusively on state contracts. Another roughly 60 employees can charge a portion of their hours to these state contracts. Envision is attempting to grow its rehabilitation department, and has several blind and sighted rehabilitation employees who are dependent on state referrals for the funding of their jobs. In short, continuing to stand up for the commission bill could have caused a significant number of blind rehabilitation and production workers to lose their jobs. This is an unacceptable consequence, so my boss and I both reluctantly concurred that the only alternative was to reduce Envision’s state systems advocacy and governmental affairs activities. I was not fired or asked to resign. I was in fact offered another job with Envision at equivalent salary and benefits.
I was treated fairly, but I chose to turn the new job down for Envision’s protection, and for my own peace of mind. Obviously, if I remained with Envision, I would be unable to do work on the commission bill. I could not represent Envision or the ACB affiliate either. After all, the essence of the message from the state officials, in whatever subtle form it was delivered, had been to silence that damned Michael Byington. The only way for me to continue working on the commission bill at all was to resign from the best and most fulfilling job I have ever had.
Oddly, I do not feel any remorse about this. If the unified effort for the commission bill was bothering the umbrella supporters enough to make them try such tactics, we must have been having some success. The fight will thus wage on.
Now in the category of what other states can learn from all of this, I want to point out a couple of tools which have been missing from our advocacy tool chest in Kansas. When advocates for the developmentally disabled re-wrote their enabling state statutes a few years ago, they added provisions which say that state-funded community developmental disability organizations cannot retaliate against agencies or individual case managers who speak out on behalf of a client or group of clients. In representing a client or clients, a direct service worker can even speak out against his or her own employer without fear of retaliation. The blindness field in Kansas, and, in fact, in most states, has no such provisions included as part of enabling statutes.
Many of our ACB affiliates have suggested to NIB affiliates in their area that they should get more involved in advocacy. As an employee of an NIB affiliate which has been a leader in such endeavors, I too had been challenging other NIB affiliates to become active as advocates. I still think this needs to happen, but now I understand that, realistically, there is a risk involved. If laws and regulations insuring autonomy for advocacy efforts are not in place first, the NIB affiliate could run the risk of losing state or rehabilitation business if they make the “wrong” people mad. This can mean a loss of blind jobs, and I do not think blind workers should have to bleed that severely for the cause of gaining control of the tax supported blind services programs.
As I write this, I have qualified for unemployment benefits. I am applying for other jobs which are not in the field of blindness, but which will afford me sufficient flexibility of hours to continue to help the Kansas ACB affiliate with the work on the commission bill, and the restoration of categorical services.
My wife and I will survive this experience. I have not been unemployed in 22 years, and it is proving to be quite an adventure. For years, our Kansas affiliate has advocated to make information systems at the one-stops accessible. Now I can focus much more specific energy on this project as I am learning firsthand exactly what is wrong with the access systems while I use those systems to look for jobs.
Several of my fellow lobbyists and professional associates have suggested that I open my own lobbying firm and continue to lobby in private practice. I am also researching this possibility. I do not know if I want to try and make a living this way, but I will establish the paper trail to start a firm. It will be called Byington Advocacy Consultation of Kansas (BACK). Whether BACK becomes my business, or something I do in my off hours, it will be a pleasure to point out to certain state officials that, “I’m BACK!”