American Council of the Blind 62nd Annual Conference and Convention
7/5/2023 9:30 AM

CONFIDENTIAL ROUGHLY EDITED REALTIME FILE
Compliments of HRICART.com

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This file was created in real time by a Human Realtime Captioner for the purpose of communication access. It is not a certified legal transcript and may not be entirely verbatim. It is intended for use by the consumer only as notes of the proceedings. A consumer should check with the presenter for any clarification of the presentation.

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AMERICAN COUNCIL OF THE BLIND
62ND ANNUAL CONFERENCE AND CONVENTION – GENERAL SESSION
JULY 5, 2023, 9:30 AM
CONFIDENTIAL ROUGHLY EDITED REALTIME FILE
Compliments of HRICART.com
***************************************
This file was created in real time by a Certified Realtime Captioner for the purpose of communication access.  It is not a certified legal transcript and may not be entirely verbatim.  It is intended for use by the consumer only as notes of the proceedings.  A consumer should check with the presenter for any clarification of the presentation.
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	>> It's 8:30.  
	>> DEB COOK LEWIS:  Good morning, everybody.  We'll be starting in about a minute.  While we're waiting to start, I'm going to review just a few of the things you have left around the building.  I need you to pick 'em up, guys.  I'm channeling your mom, you know.  
So those of you who normally like to wear the glasses, you left them somewhere, so there's these black-framed sunglasses and the gold-framed prescription sunglasses left.  And a key ring, you're going to be left out of somewhere.  And a flip phone.  I'm pretty sure several of you lost that, all right?  
The other thing I want to remind you, you still have time to reserve your banquet table.  You will need to count to eight because that is the number of seats you will have, so someone needs to be able to do that, and you can deliver the names of the people who will be sitting at the table.  You do not need to deliver the names of the dogs, just the people, who will be at the table, and you may do that at the information desk, so please take care of that if you want to sit at a banquet table with people you know or love or people you feel obligated somehow to sit with, I don't know.  However it works, but please be doing it.  Alan reports that he has only eight Braille raffle forms left.  You could get one for each person at your banquet table.  That would work.  
When we have our break, because we will have one, make Alan loud and go over and get those.  It's not tidy leaving the Braille raffle forms around.  I don't want to find those in the lost and found.  But if I do, they're mine, just so you know. 
	I have one more personal point of privilege.  My dog is going to be short one cup of dog food.  If there is someone who has a grain-free or a wellness core and you have a cup you would be willing to give us or my dog, she has been eating the small breed food this week because that's all we could find.  So that is why it's coming up a little unpredictably short, shorter than I thought. 
	All right.  We're ready to get started and we're going to begin with our Pledge of Allegiance, and today, the first-timers, our DKM first-timers will lead us in the pledge. 
	>> JENAE:  Good morning, ACB!  I want one of those raffle tickets.  This is Jenae from Ohio.  If you're able to stand, please stand.  Put your hand over your heart, if you have a heart.  All right.  I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.  Thank you, ACB!  
>> The American Council of the Blind would like to thank our 2023 convention sponsors.  Their continued support is sincerely appreciated.  Diamond sponsors -- JPMorgan Chase and Company, Microsoft, Vispero, Vanda Pharmaceuticals, Comcast. 
	Emerald sponsors -- Amazon, MGM Resorts, Cruise, Verizon, Janssen. 
	Ruby sponsors -- AT&T, Google, Waymo, Uber, Netflix, National Cable and Telecom Association (NCTA), HumanWare, Charter Communications, Adobe. 
	Onyx sponsors -- Seleste, American Printing House (APH), AIRA, Democracy Live Incorporated, Walmart, United Airlines. 
	Coral sponsors -- ACB Families, ACB Lions, National Industries For the Blind. 
	Pearl sponsors -- Library Users of America. 
	Walk sponsors -- Macular Degeneration Foundation. 
	[Applause] 
	>> DEB COOK LEWIS:  All right.  We're having just a small technical difficulty up here, if I may.  This has been one of my mornings.  In addition to everything else going on, gravity is alive and well in the building, and a cup of coffee landed itself right in the middle of me.  It's not the end of the world, of course.  Okay.  Good.  All right.  All right.  So we are now ready for our angels presentation, and -- oh, okay.  So we have our -- yeah.  Okay.  So our first Angel this morning will be Don Thomson from Hawaii, very familiar to most of us.  Let's begin with that angel.  
	>> The letters ACB, and below each, its corresponding braille cell, ACB Presents, ACB Angel, Donald Lee Thomson, May 25, 1931, to December 1, 2022.  Donald, a white man, aims a smart phone.  
	>> Donald Lee Thomson was born on May 25, 1931.  He died on December 1, 2022 at the age of 91.  Born in Modesto, California, Don was blind from childhood.  Because of this, Don's life was dedicated to overcoming adversity. 
	Anyone who knew Don understood his passion and commitment for the equal rights, opportunity, and advocacy of independence for the blind community.  His understanding, knowledge, and experience of addressing advocacy for persons with disabilities were invaluable.  But those persons that Don surrounded himself with also knew the other side of him.  While Don could certainly be loud, opinionated, and often had a curmudgeonly disposition, it only hid the heart underneath. 
	Some of us will remember Don's love of music -- jazz, in particular -- and his love of baseball and liberal politics. 
	On a memorial for Don, a friend, Stephen O'Harrow, said, he was a true friend, a friend I miss talking to every day.  Don Thomson was one helluva guy, and I doubt that we'll see anyone like him again for many a year.  In his professional life, Don obtained a Master's of Arts Degree in sociology and a concurrent Master's of Arts Degree in American Studies from the University of Hawaii in Manila in 1971.  From 1971 until 2007, Don was a professor at Leeward Community College in the social science division.  After this appointment, Don went on to the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where he took the position of professor emeritus. 
	Other accomplishments included friends of jazz Hawaii from 1990 to 1998 and having served on the state rehabilitation council. 
	And, of course, many of you know that Don dedicated a good portion of his life to the Hawaii association of the blind.  
	>> The logo, ACB, in print and Braille, American Council of the Blind, together for a bright future.  
	>> DEB COOK LEWIS:  Okay.  That was excellent.  Thank you to Chanelle Allen for reading that one and the next one we'll be having from Hawaii, and this is Amelia Cetrone.  
	>> Sparkling background, ACB presents, ACB Angle, Amelia Cetrone, December 9, 1932, July 11, 2022, a white woman with short dark hair and a broad smile.  
	>> Amelia Cetrone was born in Pennsylvania.  She passed away with her niece at her side on July 11, 2022, at the age of 89.  She grew up in a big Italian family, and her mother assisted immigrants with places to live.  It's no wonder that Amelia is best known for saying, "if I can do it, you can do it." 
She relocated to Waikiki, Hawaii, in 1942.  She met her beloved husband, who was the company comptroller.  She served on various condominium boards.  Amelia was tenacious and competitive.  She and Phil trained for running in the annual Honolulu marathon.  She ran with a group of friends and started running in her late 40s and went on to run in nine consecutive marathons.  She served as a board member and treasurer of Hawaii association of the blind.  She became a vital component of the organization and could be an encouraging member in a multitude of tasks.  Amelia beloved in giving something 110% and believed that every member, oldest to youngest, had something to offer HCB.  
She could always be heard saying, I need to teach you young ones.  Her organization from the young ones has left a hole in the fabric, but she will remain in our hearts forever.  
>> The logo, ACB, in print and Braille, American Council of the Blind, together for a bright future.  
	>> DEB COOK LEWIS:  Wow.  She was someone I did not know, but she sounds like a very, very special and energetic person.  That's wonderful.  All right.  Our final angel for this morning is Liz Klein from California.  
	>> Against a sparkling background, the letters ACB and below, the corresponding Braille cell, Liz Klein, a white woman, posing outdoors.  
	>> Liz Klein was born in California, and spent most of her childhood in Kentucky.  Attended the Kentucky School for the Blind and many people still remember her fondly.  She was a member of the San Francisco Association of the Blind, the San Francisco Lighthouse, as many have been -- you could find Liz at the San Francisco chapter table as our student education access grant.  During the pandemic, Liz made -- to be distributed to cancer patients to the lighthouse in San Francisco.  
Liz was an amazing person.  She was always volunteering, always had a smile on her face.  Sometimes she had a smirk on her face.  And as her vision got worse and worse and worse, she finally decided to use a cane.  But she kept on volunteering.  She kept on working.  She kept on contributing, pretty much until her last days.  She was a force to be reckoned with.  But she will be remembered in our hearts for the rest of our lives, and she is survived by her son, Anthony, and two grandsons.  We will miss you, Liz.  You are a real trooper, and you contributed so much.  Thank you so much for giving a wonderful life.  
	>> The logo, ACB, in print and Braille, American Council of the Blind.  Together for a bright future.  
	>> DEB COOK LEWIS:  All right.  We are running slightly ahead of schedule.  I know we have the people who are here in person, before we do it, before I turn things over to Kim, I want to just mention, because it's always sort of hard and confusing, and this is probably the best time to have all of you and your attention, I want to talk about today's voting, because today is the day we will be voting again.  And it is our final voting of the year, so savor it and enjoy it, but make sure you do it, for cryin' out loud.  
Koni shared a story, a member is off to Brazil and is setting his alarm every day to check to see if he needs to be voting for something because the time zone changes and everything are kind of wonky.  So if a guy off in Brazil can get his vote in for his individual vote and his affiliate vote and get them all in on time, I think the rest of us can do that, right?  So this afternoon, the polls will be open from 2:00 to 6:00 Central Time.  That's where we are, Central Time.  And the rest of you have to figure out the time zones because I have to figure them out all the time, so you can do it.  You Eastern Time zone people can do it one time.  2:00 to 6:00 p.m., Central Time, which is 3:00 if you're in the east and don't know.  And in four hours, you should be able to log in and get yourself the vote.  But it's a pretty big vote, so we're going to be voting today on the two bylaw amendments that have been discussed and the three resolutions that you requested a record vote for.  So you need to vote all those, and they're all listed on your ballot, and you'll be able to vote for each one. 
	Keep track of how you voted that and send that information, however how your delegates for states and special interest affiliates have told you.  I've seen some nice, elaborate processes that some affiliates have put together to make this easy for you, so next year I know who might be able to give some training.  But anyway, basically, you want to get that information to them.  I would get it done right away.  Even though they're not going to be actually reporting until in the morning, you don't want to have to make them take off their shoes and keep counting those votes all at the last minute.  
So please, get your vote in this afternoon.  Go ahead and vote to your affiliates, however many you need to go through, and we will be having that roll call vote tomorrow morning, right about now, so you want to be here and ready for that. 
	So without any further ado, I'm going to turn our festivities over to our presiding officer for today.  We usually work through the officers to be the presiding officer, but we hardly ever get to our past president because we have first and second complements and secretaries and treasurers and things.  But this year, we actually have a space in there from having no second vice president these last few months, so I invited Kim Charlson, our immediate past president, to be our facilitator today, and she's going to be facilitating an interesting panel and the ADP awards, and the special presentation from Be My Eyes, so she's going to be busy and I hope you all enjoy your program this morning.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Thank you, Deb, and I do have to say, I was not expecting to be here.  Well, I was expecting to be here but not at the podium, perhaps.  We all had a few changes and what's the core value we have here at ACB?  Flexibility!  
So I was getting myself a few months ago all geared up to rotate off the board because I wouldn't be immediate past president anymore.  That was going to be a guy named Vance Boone back in January and February.  So I was getting ready to say good-bye to the board, and then things changed.  And suddenly, people were saying, well, Van isn't going to be vice president and Executive Director.  That is absolutely correct.  You are so right.  And we said, well, I guess maybe we'll keep Kim around a little longer.  So here I am, much to the chagrin of some of you, perhaps, but I am still here.  And very happy to be here.  [Applause]    
All right.  So the first panel we have this morning is for information on increasing access for professionals who are blind with low vision services.  And this is a conversation that Clark Rachfal will be mad rating today about service providers, professionals in the field, and consumer stakeholders on evolving the plan today of vision rehabilitation services.  So there's a lot of nuance to this conversation, and Clark has pulled together a very qualified group of people to talk us through some of these nuances of this subject.  So it's my pleasure to turn the mic over to Clark Rachfal, our director of advocacy and governmental affairs at ACB.  [Applause] 
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  It is on now?  There we go.  All right.  Good morning, ACB.  
	>> Good morning.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Planning the convention and talking with our president, Deb Cook Lewis, you know, Clark, I don't think moderating a panel with ACB members, guide dog handlers with Uber is going to be enough of a challenge for you.  So, you know this thing out there about vision rehabilitation and certification?  Why don't you take that one as well.  So that's where we are here this morning.  
And I'm very happy that we have some people here, so our panelist, the board chair for the academy of certification, our rehabilitation and education programs, ACB REP, that is Jamie Dean joining us virtually on Zoom.  We also have the Executive Director of the association of education and rehabilitation is here, and that is Lee Sonnenberg from ACR in here in person at his first ACB convention.  [Applause] 
Also joining us virtually on Zoom is Lauren Branch, CEO of Oklahoma, provides employment and rehabilitation services.  And also here in person, we have Lori Scharff.  With education and -- as a vision rehabilitation therapist and last, but not least, the president of our special interests affiliate alliance on aging and vision loss, Doug Powell.  [Applause]    
So to kick things off, I'd first like to recognize Jamie Dean to provide some background on ACVREP, but also to provide information on vision certification for occupational therapists.  Following Jamie, I would like to recognize Lee Sonnenberg because the board of directors for VR passed a resolution -- I think it's fair to say, expressing some concerns about the certification and the process.  
So I'd like to recognize Jamie Dean first, followed by Lee, and then we'll have the conversation flow from there.  Once we have opening remarks from our panelists, I will direct some cross questions and see if our panelists have questions of one another, and then at the end, we will also open it up to audience Q&A for all of you here in the room as well as the folks on Zoom in alternating back and forth.  Sound good, folks?  All right.  Let's do it. 
	Well, Jamie Dean, good morning, how are you?
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  Good, thanks for having me.  Greetings from North Carolina.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Why don't you give a background on ACVREP and what they are hoping to accomplish with the certification for occupational therapists?  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  I want to point out that nobody cheered when you introduced me, Clark, so I think I'm working from a disadvantage here today.  
I want to start out with an anecdote that many of you will be familiar with.  I am now 41, which is a little disappointing for me.  After being a competitive rower, one of the things I've earned at 41 is a pretty crummy back and I went to the chiropractor to see if I could get some help.  And the chiropractor had no idea what to do with me as a blind person.  So he was really surprised, first of all, that I had a job, which was interesting, and he was very surprised at my activity level, that I like to do run and hike and all of these fun outdoor pursuits.  How could I possibly feel confident that I was getting competent care from someone who didn't understand anything about vision loss or anything about what a person with vision loss might actually be doing in their life?  I really couldn't, and thus, I am not working with that chiropractor any longer. 
	But unfortunately, that's a reality for many blind and low vision people.  When we encounter the medical system, we encounter people who aren't actually qualified to understand the complexity of our medical needs as they may intersect with our vision loss.  So what ACVREP does, we are on a mission to make sure that all of us receive low-vision services from qualified professionals.  Now, the way that we go about doing that is using the tool of certification.  What certification is an objective exam, scope of criteria, and our scope of practice and criteria for various fields of practice.  That will demonstrate that a professional is competent to practice within that field. 
	So you have a scope of practice and competence piece, but there's also an ethics piece.  And by being certified, you are subject to a code of practice and discipline from ACVREP if you violate that code of ethics.  So the past few years, one of the things we have been looking at is certifying occupational therapists who work with people who are low vision.  Let me give you a couple of reasons the board felt that was an important step for us to take.  So the reason, there's a need for people to provide services to the blind and visually impaired.  There's a tremendous shortage of qualified professionals to provide services. 
	The second reason, occupational therapists are already a part of the medical model.  They're like my chiropractor.  They're already providing services and they're already encountering people who are blind or people who are low vision and as a part of their work at occupational therapists, they're figuring out how they can perform specific tasks that are important to their daily lives.  So they're already providing services.  And yet without an objective, exam-based certification that demonstrates that they're competent to do it. 
	The third reason this is important to the board is that our mission is not just to have competent professionals in the United States.  Our mission is for blind people around the world to receive services from competent professionals and internationally, occupational therapists provide these services.  So that's for the certification of OTs.  Do OTs want this?  Is this an important thing for OTs themselves?  It's nice in theory, but the professional side.  And that was a part of the due diligence that we did after determining we thought there was an opportunity to provide more qualified professionals and providing services, we also talked to the OT community about certification and so we conducted a broad survey in partnership with the University of Alabama at Birmingham of occupational therapists, and we asked if there was something you would be interested in and the overwhelming response was yes. 
	The final thing we took into consideration, there had been in the past a certification for occupational therapists that was offered by another certified body, and that certified body for a lot of reasons, not related to the certification itself, decided to put a pause on certifying occupational therapists.  So there is also a vacuum where there had been a way for occupational therapists to support people who are blind or low vision.  That certification was discontinued.  So there was a need for another body to step in and provide a certification, again, so we have a way of demonstrating occupational therapists have the core competencies.  I'll say very briefly, the way we've gone about doing these certification, right now, we're very early in the certification process.  But the way we've gone about creating certification is exactly the way that ACVREP has created all the other certifications, for folks who teach assistive technology and orientation ability.  I'm happy to talk about that.  We aren't doing anything different with that. 
	So in short, to sum up, we are adding an OT certification to fill a vacuum in service providers and also in objective certifications to demonstrate competency.  We think this is a way to both improve the skills of people who are already providing services as well as bring new service providers into the field, and I know that this will be a robust conversation, so I am excited to be here and appreciate the invitation and look forward to sharing with the other panelists.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Jamie.  [Applause]  Jamie, there's a round of applause.  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  I got some cheers.  I had to pander pretty hard to get that.  I appreciate that.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  When you come to your first ACB convention, we'll make sure there's a standing ovation.  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  Looking forward to it.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Now I'll turn it over to Lee Sonnenberg from AVR to share his perspectives on the organization.  
	>> LEE SONNENBERG:  Thank you, Clark.  Yes, executive director, serve on the -- at our boards.  
My name is Lee Sonnenberg, I am the Executive Director for AER, the association of education and rehabilitation of the blind and visually impaired.  I've been at AER for a little over a year, but I have had a life experience of living with someone who is visually impaired.  My youngest daughter who is visually impaired just completed her second year at Texas in art.  And I've been involved in advocacy in Texas for probably the past 15 years.  Currently serve as board president of Texas school of the blind and visually impaired.  So I've lived the life of a parent making sure that my kid had all the services that she needed.  
I agree with Jamie's statement earlier of the lack, the shortage of providers that we are experiencing currently.  AER's concern regarding the whole certification process was just the lack of transparency and felt a lack of input from them regarding the process.  Conversations began last summer at our conference in St. Louis where it had been -- members had heard about this certification that was being considered and it was all coming through the grapevine.  Everyone was very concerned about the process and our VRTs were concerned this was going to affect our ability to get jobs and nobody is listening to our input.  So there was concern.  There was fear.  And just a lot of questions and those questions continued to be raised to our board and throughout the fall and over the winter season. 
	This past spring, the membership's concerns rose to a crescendo where the board felt there was a need to respond to the ACB and the professionals -- and that includes OTs from earned VRT certification, were concerned about the lack of transparency and lack of input.  So the board put forth the resolution.  It's not an anti-OT resolution.  It's all very much a -- we all need to be coming to the table to work together to solve this problem and we need to look at all of the solutions, all the possible solutions to increase our personnel who are providing services to all individuals, not only adults, but students, who are blind and low vision.  And that has just been the concern of the board, that there be more transparency, more interaction, and more participation of the community in this process.  It's not just going to be a one size fits all.  
AER just wrapped up our strategic planning process and addressing shortage, addressing that is one of our big pushes over the next few years.  But this is going to have to be a community-wide action.  Everyone sitting at the table and helping formulate those ideas and working together to expand the number of professionals that are providing services.  And so, again, that was the justification for the board resolution is we need transparency.  We all need to be working on this together.  And it's not going to be a one-size-fits-all.  We've got to find something that works, but we all need to be there together making that discussion.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Lee, and the ACB member body voted and adopted a similar resolution on Monday, July 3rd.  Basically echoing nothing about us without us, that people in the community need to be involved in the process, and at this point I'd like to turn it to one of the primary authors of that resolution, Lori Scharff, and versus, a vision rehabilitation therapist.  [Cheering and Applause] 
	>> LORI SCHARFF:  There we go.  I need vision rehab to learn how to work a mic.  Doug says a qualified person.  Yes.  Thank you for having me, Clark, and I would just like to make a few additional comments to what has already been said.  As Lee has already stated, several occupational therapists have gone on to receive masters in teaching and orientation and mobility because of their understanding of their lack of body of knowledge related to blindness and visual impairment.  And it's important for us as consumers to understand that same medical professional that Jamie spoke of at the beginning is similar to what you would receive by an occupational therapist with limited training.  Only in low vision, for example, or excluding certain areas of blindness rehabilitation. 
	To fully understand what the capabilities of a person who is blind or low vision, specifically those with additional disabilities -- DeafBlindness, senior citizens, you know, with degenerative disk disease that may impact their ability to move and function in the kitchen, for example, you really need to understand the whole person.  You also need to understand that you could train in low vision, but depending on someone's environment is going to depend on if they function as a person with low vision or no vision.  So you really can't teach somebody a limited scope of service and expect that they provide top-quality service. 
	In addition, ACVREP states that there are under 600 professionals credentialed.  I will tell you that lots of vision rehabilitation therapists do not certify because the Rehabilitation Services Administration does not require it, and many states do not require it.  So don't let that figure fool you.  
Yes, I acknowledge there's a shortage, and yes, I believe the shortage needs to be dealt with.  But there are programs similar to the one that's being done in New York with Empire College where people are receiving bachelor's level training in blindness skills and going on to get additional credits on a master's level if they choose to, to provide services.  And those bachelor's level students are learning Braille, are learning low vision and nonvisual techniques of rehabilitation. 
	So I think we need to look at a continuum of options.  Thank you.  [Cheering and Applause] 
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you so much, Lori, and at this time, I'd like to invite Lauren Branch as the CEO of an organization serving people who are blind.  Lauren, I think you can offer a unique perspective from the service provider lens, as someone seeking to employ occupational therapists, vision rehab services and so on to serve people who are blind and low vision.  
	>> LAUREN BRANCH:  Thank you, Clark, and I appreciate the opportunity to be here this morning.  So yes, I'm speaking on behalf of an agency who provides both employment and comprehensive rehabilitation services for people who are blind here in our community in Oklahoma. 
	Our agency started our rehab program -- I don't even know how many years ago.  It's been probably a little over 15 years ago, you know, when I started here at NewView, we did not provide rehabilitation services, we were just doing employment.  And we really saw the need in our community to be able to provide services here in our state because there were so many individuals who were blind and visually impaired who were not receiving services. 
	So we went about trying to stand up a vision rehabilitation program, utilizing the traditional pathway, in particular, you know, I had hired an individual who was a certified orientation instructor, had been in the field a long time to work with me to stand up the program.  And we tried desperately to hire a VRT who -- in Oklahoma and we had our job posted for over a year, I believe, and unfortunately, we were not able to attract any certified professionals to relocate to come to Oklahoma to work for New View to help us stand up the program.  And so we really entered this crossroads where we said, we're either going to not provide services or we've got to figure out a different way to do that.  And, you know, Oklahoma is a pretty rural state.  You know, our main office is in our largest city here in Oklahoma City.  We only have two primary population centers here.  So a lot of the individuals that we serve are not either in Oklahoma City or in Tulsa, but they're in our rural communities. 
	You know, when we talk about not providing services as opposed to providing services, I mean, you know, we took the not providing services off the table because the need was so great.  So we had to figure out a different way to do it.  At the time, some of you may remember Lighthouse International, which is now Lighthouse Guild, had a beta program to train individuals, in particular, certified occupational therapy assistants and subsequently occupational therapists and blindness and low vision.  
About 15 years ago we partnered with them to bring on our first COTA and occupational therapist, but we wanted to make sure that our professionals were adequately trained and competent to provide services for individuals who are blind and so the first two professionals that we hired actually trained for about a year in that program and over the years we've been able to expand services here in Oklahoma because of our ability to hire and train both OTs and CODAs in our community.  
I will tell you that the lack of personnel, the lack of VRTs in our community has not changed in the last 15 years.  It's still very, very hard to find trained professionals here in Oklahoma.  Part of the reason for that is that there are no degree programs in the state of Oklahoma that graduate professionals in this field.  And so we've been very proud of the fact that we've put together a multidisciplinary team that includes occupational therapist, certified occupational therapy assistants.  Those are duly certified at ACVREP certified.  We have certified orientation and mobility specialists, TVI, along with assistive technology professionals as well.  
I would tell you we would not have been able to provide the number of services and the level of services we provide if we had not gone in this direction.  So our agency fully supports, you know, all of the pathways to ensure that we have qualified staff, providing services in this space.  We recognize that occupational therapists and CODAs do not get the level of training coming out of school they need to be able to provide competent services for individuals who are blind or visually impaired.  And so, you know, I believe that the certification through ACVREP is going to help us provide assurances in this space that the individuals who are already providing services out there, in particular, to our older population, who are having vision issues, are competent and trained to be able to provide these services. 
	I think we all know that the population of individuals who are blind or visually impaired is growing, particularly in our aging services arena.  And we certainly today don't have the number of trained professionals that we need in our field to be able to deliver the services to this growing number of individuals. 
	You know, on a side note, and this was mentioned by Jamie, one of the advantages that we've seen in particular as far as having OTs and CODAs is our medical community recognizes those individuals in the allied health arena and are considerable providing referrals to those individuals for services.  Once we are able to get the individuals in the door under the referrals from our medical community, that opens the door to access for all of the services -- assistive technology, orientation and mobility. 
	I can tell you that it was a struggle to connect the medical community with our agency at times because the doctors didn't understand the vision rehabilitation fields and what we found in particular with our older individuals who are coming through our clinic for services is their connection point is really through the medical community.  It's through the ophthalmology professionals who are treating retinal diseases.  So without that connection, we were finding that a number of the individuals who could benefit and needed the services that we provided were never getting the services because they weren't coming through the traditional doors through our state vocational rehabilitation agencies. 
	And so, you know, just to reiterate, there's a huge need for trained professionals.  We would love to see the number of VRTs grow in our communities.  But as someone mentioned before, it's not a one-size-fits-all.  But I think first and foremost, we need to be committed to having trained professionals providing these services and supporting a certification program is one avenue in which we can get there.  Thank you.  [Applause] 
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  And Lauren, thank you so much.  Obviously, this is a situation in Oklahoma, but Oklahoma is not unique in this regard.  Right?  So there's lots of states out there.  There are lots of you in the room here that live in rural areas or areas adjacent to population centers that may not have ready access to trained professionals and services similar to, as Lauren was describing, in Oklahoma, outside of Tulsa and Oklahoma City. 
	Lauren also mentioned the growing population of people with vision loss, and yes, that is true.  This population is also an aging population of people with vision loss.  And that's why I'm very excited to have our colleague and board member Doug Powell, who is also the president of AAVL.  So Doug, I'd like to turn it to you to hear your perspective on this topic.  
	>> LORI SCHARFF:  Clark, this is Lori, if I could say one thing.  With the universities doing a hybrid approach vision rehabilitation therapy and orientation and mobility programs really are available.  But when you put people in situations where they don't have a local supervisor who can supervise them because they don't have a credential, that, then, presents a problem.  So in states where we do have people who have the ability to supervise or when we have people who are able to supervise remotely, we are able to bring people into the professionals and keep them in their home communities.  Thank you.  
	>> LAUREN BRANCH:  Clark, do you mind if I just make a comment to that?  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  You may make one quick comment.  I'd like to make Doug say his part before the cross-questioning.  
	>> LAUREN BRANCH:  I just want to say, that is the issue for us here in Oklahoma in terms of being able to get our OTs and COTAs with VRT.  We have CLBT, because we had someone for them to work under, but we've not been able to, because we don't have a VRT, there's no one for them to work under in the local community to get those additional hours that they need for the certifications, so that is a problem for us here in Oklahoma as well.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you.  And I'll turn it to Doug.  
	>> DOUG POWELL:  Thank you, Clark.  Are you confused yet?  Welcome to my world.  So I started at president of AAVL last year.  Some of you know I've been the chair or co-chair of the rehabilitation issues task force for probably 12 years or so.  But I was new to the area of older individuals.  So, you know, so in preparation for this, I've been asking a lot of probing questions which some people may think I was the enemy.  Hopefully not.  I was just trying to figure out what you're going through right now, trying to figure out, you know, well, you know, what are -- excuse me.  What are all the issues. 
	And here's what I've decided.  That all of these -- and -- yeah.  What I learned is what they've known for a long time.  The current system is largely broken.  And you know, the OT, VRT issue, is just one of many that we're going to have to confront that are all intersecting.  No one has mentioned the differential between how occupational therapists get paid versus how VRTs get paid.  So there's tons of issues that haven't even come up yet and I've been interested that everybody has been fairly civilized so far.  But you know what, there's a lot of passion on everybody's side, you know, in terms of these issues.  And everybody wants to do well for blind and visually impaired individuals.  This is what I found out. 
	So what we need to do, then -- so AAVL believes in four basic premises.  The first one is the recognition, is that 95% of people, eligible for visual rehabilitation services in this country are not being served.  95%.  That cannot stand. 
	Two.  Older people in our communities, in our country, and around the world, have been contributing members of society and with rehabilitation services ought to be able to continue to be contributing members of their communities. 
	Three.  People who are blind or have low vision deserve to have people working with them who are fully qualified and can provide excellent services. 
	And four.  I don't think I'm going beyond what people would say is true to say that certified vision rehabilitation therapists in this country are underrecognized and deserve access to all areas where they can provide services to blind and visually impaired people.  [Applause]    
So given those four basic premises and given that number of -- well, so I'm going to create an analogy here.  I play Sudoku.  Blind Sudoku is great, so I play it all the time.  What Sudoku is, a grid of nine rows and nine columns and you can divide those 81 squares into nine, three by three blocks.  And at the beginning of the puzzle, you're given several that are filled in.  And using those, using logic, you have to fill in the rest of the blocks on the grid.  It's fun.  It's challenging.  It keeps your brain young.  And I don't diminish anybody by saying that the VRT-OT certification is just one block in that 81-square grid.  And all of the issues are just as important as this.  And we're not going to -- we're not going to solve the problems that we're confronting in this arena just by working out whether we certify OTs in 17 areas or 10 areas or whatever. 
	So what's -- the other analogy I'm going to draw, go further on the analogy and say, when I filled in a square incorrectly and I've gone down further, I've used logic to try to fill in more squares based on my mistakes, guess what?  It ain't gonna work.  I'm not going to come up with the solution.  So I think it's -- that's similar to where we are in whole, working with older people and nonvocational people and vocational people, for that matter, in giving them vision and rehab services. 
	We need to go back -- what I do, I erase the whole thing and I start over from the very beginning.  And I think, really, that's what we need to do here.  So all stakeholders -- and I mean all.  I mean, you know, I don't think we've even thought of how many stakeholders we need to, you know, to be involved in this decision, you know, in this rebuilding effort.  
To get -- I don't know if you were here yesterday when Eric Bridges was speaking about, you know, about his role in AFB.  And if you remember one of the questions, Anisio Correia, who is the -- has a lot of experience in running nonprofit agencies, working with these issues, they started talking about a summit that might, you know, that bringing people together, to actually talk and hammer out some kind of a result that hopefully will be, you know, beneficial for everybody.  So some of the stakeholders that I think ought to be there are Medicaid and Medicare and private insurances.  [Applause]  Certainly certification entities, accrediting, and the professional, professional people, you know, professional organizations like AER.  Oh, and also, yeah, preparation.  So there are lots of colleges and universities who do not have programs.  You have to look hard to find programs for vision and vocational rehabilitation therapists, so we need those programs and input from those people to fix the problems. 
	Rehab and agency administrators.  I think I said professional organization representatives, like us, and like AER, you know, and other folks.  State and political representatives.  So it seems to me the -- for example, the Older Americans Act is coming up for reauthorization in September.  And so there's going to be some political things.  We're probably going to have to make some legislative changes so that, you know, so, for example, so that the pay may be, you know, or the recognition may be expanded to include VRTs. 
	And obviously, citizen representatives in our communities.  And there's possibly lots of other stakeholders that I've forgotten.  But that's a starting list to who probably ought to be at the table to try to come up with some kind of a solution that works for everybody.  And in summary, the sooner we get started with these, obviously, the sooner we can start trying to provide services, meaningful services, to those 95% of people who are sitting at home, isolated, and, you know, feeling incompetent, feeling, you know, not confident, and not able to lead their most independent, fulfilling lives.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Great.  Thank you, Doug, and thank you to all of our panelists here today.  [Applause]  As Doug underscored, there's a lot of members of our community who are going unserved and unserved by trained professionals. 
	I'm cognizant of the time.  We have plenty of time, but I don't want to take it all up.  I'll ask one question of our panelists, Jamie Dean and Lauren Branch, but I look forward to hearing to the others and then I'd like to give the panelists the opportunity to ask one question of their peers or up here on the panel, to keep the conversation flowing.  
So we hear about the number of people who are going unserved.  We hear about the shortage of trained professionals, and specifically, vision rehabilitation therapists.  But even a trained occupational therapist is still not a VRT, is not a vision rehabilitation therapist.  A vision-trained occupational therapist is still not a certified orientation and mobility instructor.  So, again, starting with Jamie and then Lauren, how will this vision certification help increase the number of trained professionals in the categories where everyone can agree that the number of trained professionals is lacking?  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  Thanks, Clark.  So I'll start by saying we need to be careful when we think about the certification and think about what it is and what it isn't.  What it is, I really like Doug's analogy, it's one square of a Sudoku puzzle.  It's not the solution to the entire Sudoku puzzle. 
	And I'm speaking as the chair of ACVREP.  We believe very strongly in all of our certifications and all of the professionals we certify, and we think they all provide a vital role throughout the ecosystem of service providers.  So certainly I wouldn't say that this is now an alternative to all service providers or some super provider.  So the scope of practice -- we need to be care.  The scope of practice for the certification has not yet been created.  So it is being created right now.  And then a draft of the scope of practice, what the certificates will actually be qualified or examined on, a draft of that will be released to the public for comments, and we would love to receive robust comments from everybody in the community about that so we can get that scope of practice right.  So I can't answer this question with complete precision because we're at a very nascent stage in the certification. 
	But what I can say, when you look at the scope of practice, one thing that stands out starkly, none of them operate in silos.  A CLVT or the -- these are certificates who look -- a CRVT look at the occupational therapist does, the skill set, the environment, what they want to accomplish and help them accomplish that by using assistive technology.  But we have people, we also certify people who do certified orientation and mobility specialists.  
So a CVRT has a broad role, more than what I just mentioned, but more of a collaborative people that have a lot of overlap.  So the OT certification, I've heard critiques that people feel like it is overlapping with other things we do.  That might be true.  But all of our certifications overlap and also offer something special.  So that special is, A, occupational therapist approach to problem solving, which is a task-based approach and a vocational-based approach.  That's the nature of the training.  So I think that's a unique perspective on problem-solving that they will bring.  And I think they also bring access because they are a part of this medical model.  So they bring access to other professionals who may otherwise never encounter a service provider. 
	And then I think the other thing to keep in mind is that we don't expect an OT to do everything.  There will be overlap, but it's not a complete overlap.  We won't expect the certificants to teach children or -- and, you know, I guess I'll save my question, but I will -- I'm going to cheat.  I'm going to throw a question in right now, Clark, and just say, what are our solutions that people see to solving a problem?  ACVREP is doing something.  We're taking action.  It's not the only thing that we're doing.  But this is one solution.  
And I feel like it's very easy to critique an idea when it's put forward.  You know, the first person to stick their head up out of a fox hole gets shot at.  So we've taken on the role of sticking our head out of the fox hole, but I think we need to be careful as a community of nonprofit service providers and organizations to make sure that we're critiquing and collaborating in a way that's actually effective, positive, and driving towards a solution rather than just taking shots about everything that we see that could potentially go wrong with something or could potentially be problematic about it because at the end of the day, we need solutions.  
Everyone on this panel desperately agrees that we need solutions and this is one that has been put on the table.  So we invite feedback on it.  We've had feedback already and have more feedback communities coming up, but I really feel there's feedback, it can be focused on something productive rather than just attacking what people fear or what people don't understand or what people are unsure of.  It's better for all of us.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Jamie.  And Lauren, you touched on this a little bit earlier, but I'd still like to hear from you again or have you elaborate on how thinking and reframing my original question, with still having a shortage of trained professionals, how does having occupational therapists or certified occupational therapists in low vision accreditation, how does that help you in the other areas where you still lack trained professionals?  I believe you stated you're still struggling to get vision rehabilitation therapists there in Oklahoma.  
	>> LAUREN BRANCH:  So I mean, I think the -- you know, I appreciate what Jamie said.  I mean, you know, we -- I don't know if we're ever -- I mean, I hope we do, eventually, are able to get, you know, a VRT here in Oklahoma.  But, you know, the challenge for us is the option to not provide services is just not on the table.  I mean, there are so many people as the other panelists have mentioned, that are not getting services.  I mean, we should be -- you know, we as a field, I agree, should be trying for solutions to get to those 95% who aren't receiving services. 
	So our position is, you know, is, you know what, if this is the way that -- if this is where we can build capacity in our field, then we need to ensure that these professionals are adequately trained.  The last thing that we want are people out there trying to provide services and address issues in this realm, and they're just not qualified to -- they're just not qualified to do it. 
	So our team works, our team and COTAs work, working in conjunction with our assistive technology professionals, with our -- with our CBIs.  And by the way, I will say that our COTAs, we require our COTAs to be trained in Braille.  One of the issues around VRTs is that -- is the Braille training.  We require that here at NewView because we understand that that's a critical component that needs to be evaluated and available to the people that we're serving, and we'll tell you, though, that when we start talking about the population of older individuals with vision impairment, still, the vast majority of them are really -- operate more in the low vision realm than they do in the totally blindness realm.  
And so, you know, and the OTs are trained, you know, when we talk about critical problem solving, when we talk about problem solving in the areas and activities of daily living, what we found is in a lot of instances, that the OTs recognize issues too that are outside -- especially with our older individuals, that are outside of the realm of what VRTs do, and, you know, so we're -- we're supportive of providing access for everyone and ensuring that confident -- that there are competencies that these professionals have in this arena rather than -- if these services are not provided by OTs that are not trained, we're fooling ourselves, because they are being put in contact with and providing services to individuals who are blind or visually impaired and they're doing it without adequate training and so, you know, I think that we're supportive of a multipronged approach, interdisciplinary approach.  We want our teams working together and learning from one another.  As people have mentioned, this is only one little block in the solution.  But I think we need to have all options on the table and we need to be driving towards, you know, solutions-based programs and opportunities and so I don't really know what else to say about that.  But that's the direction we've taken, and it's been very successful.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Lauren.  I'll turn it to Lee Sonnenberg to see if he has any comments on what's been shared thus far.  
	>> LEE SONNENBERG:  Thank you.  I really am in agreement with Doug's visual of the Sudoku puzzle, because really, there are a lot of different blocks to provide the services and to solve, to address the various issues.  I'll go back that it has to be a collaborative solution to solving the problem.  One body just can't -- it's very strongly that we should have multiple folks at the table when we're making these decisions and these plans that affect a very growing population. 
	The 95% is even more positive than I've heard.  I've heard that only 3% are receiving the services.  And how many of those are facilities that with some basic training could be living independently.  But it's a big group project, but to me, it's the consensus.  We all need to be at the table working together.  [Applause] 
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you.  And Lori or Doug, anything you'd like to add at this point?  
	>> LORI SCHARFF:  This is Lori.  If I could just add -- Doug is laughing -- if agencies and states are committed to hiring vision occupational therapists, they hire them as an intern and keep them as an employee.  Several of my classmates either moved from where they were living or took internships in other states that were paid so that they could still afford to live.  Because the agencies they were working with are committed to the field of blindness and low vision.  And, you know, as a result of that, we all got good education because we worked with agencies who were able to show us the way. 
	So all of the university programs have room for more professionals, but we, the professionals, need the commitment by the employers and in talking with the person who is the division chair for AER, vision rehab therapy division, his quote is that when an agency pays well, they have the ability to hire people.  Thank you.  [Applause] 
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  So at this point, Lori, since you have the microphone, is there a question that you'd like to ask your fellow panelists?  
	>> LORI SCHARFF:  I would like to ask if ACVREP has ever counted the amount of vision rehabilitation therapy candidates for their exam who may have taken the exam but never passed and never came back to take the exam because it was too expensive.  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  That's a good question, Lori.  
	>> LORI SCHARFF:  I'm not asking that to be obnoxious.  The test is $700 plus an administrative fee.  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  Yeah, I think that's a great question, Lori.  Obviously, I could not answer a question like that with any kind of precision but ask a question that I can answer and I can answer it.  If your question, if the critique is that the certification is expensive, I would point out that we do offer scholarships to folks.  We do have opportunities to take beta exams when they're available that are less expensive.  I know there's lots of financial support in various university programs and I'm also a professional in a certified way, a licensed professional, and it is expensive.  I agree with that.  But ACVREP is not a for-profit entity.  We have one -- two full-time employees, a president and an administrative assistant.  We are not paying her an exorbitant salary by any stretch.  Our board members are all volunteer.  So we don't set fees because we're trying to drive up revenue.  We set fees because we're trying to be a viable institution to continue providing services to the community who needs them.  And if there's a way to do that for free, we would love to do that, but that's not a realistic possibility.  
	>> DOUG POWELL:  Clark, this is Doug.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Yes, Doug.  
	>> DOUG POWELL:  I'm sitting next to Kim Charlson who has been working with ACVREP for a couple of years now for audio description purveyors.  And I'm going to side with ACVREP on this.  They have put out a lot of money to put this certification -- all of their certifications together on a nonprofit basis, and then RSA says, well, you don't have to have the actual certification to provide services.  You just need to have taken the courses.  And that leaves ACVREP kind of out, you know, out the money that they've used for developing, so they can't continue to provide the services that we hope that they will provide in terms of certification standards if they can't, you know, if they're not getting money back.  
So that's another block in our Sudoku puzzle is, you know, how do we make sure that ACVREP is getting the money that they need to, you know, to continue to provide their services as well as not -- you know, not putting the burden, maybe, on the applicants for the certification?  So again, there's another area of discussion for this -- for this summit that I would like to see us put together.  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  And Clark, this is Jamie.  If I could jump in, a piece that Doug, you raised earlier, that kind of shows the scope of what ACVREP is also thinking about, we're trying to support all of our certifications.  And Doug, you raise the concept of Medicare reimbursability or who is paying for services.  This is a huge problem.  I think if all of our certificants were reimbursed, what I would say is that we don't -- we're not ignoring that issue.  I think that folks at ACB should know this, Lee should know this from AER, but under this administration, to see if we can change the reimbursability rules of Medicare and they've asked all of our organizations for money and I know that my organization as of -- our board meeting last week has committed money.  As I said, we're not a huge organization.  They have asked for $50,000 and we've committed to contribute 15.  So I think it's an opportunity to put their money where their mouth is and have a huge benefit and increase the attractiveness of coming into the field, not just the attractiveness of certification, but the attractiveness of working in these rehab professions.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Lee, is there a question you would like to ask your fellow panelists?  Great.  
	>> LEE SONNENBERG:  To follow up what Jamie just said about the VisionServe Alliance project, that will be on the AER's board of directors agenda where I will ask them to join in this program and provide funding, I'm not sure AER will be able to provide the level that ACVREP is providing, but we are participating and as Jamie said, putting our money where our mouth is, because it is very important that, again, one more block in the puzzle is addressed.  And Jamie, this question is for you, just regards to the certification process.  
Earlier this spring we did have in the Town Hall meetings with concerns raised about the certification process.  Can you tell me if ACVREP has had any actions moving forward in response to some of the concerns that AER members rate?  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  Thank you for the question, almost like a planted question, because it's a point I wanted to cover, so thank you.  I want to say this is delicate.  I work in the accessibility field.  I strongly believe in the concept of nothing about us without us.  And on that concept, we have to have a certain number of people who are blind, who are certificants, and we check all of those boxes.  There is a lot of brain trust on the board itself.  But the board, when they're making their decisions, our balancing the due diligence and exploring opportunity, which is a fiduciary responsibility of saying, we also have to do -- we have to do what is in line with ACVREP's mission.  So the way that in the past we have solicited broader feedback, after the board has said, yes, let's go forward and doing a certification, we've done a public comment period.  Once there's a scope of practice that people can read and understand and give us a more fulsome critique of. 
	What we've done in the case of this certification, because the response in the community, the first thing we did was a listening session with around 120ish people.  And I think we've realized in retrospect, we should have been even broader.  We should have reached out to ACB and others and just advertised that was happening.  And we have published statements on our website about the certification, but I don't think that people are coming to read the ACVREP website on a daily basis so we need to think about other communication channels. 
	And I do hope to have more listening sessions, but the other thing the board has just approved, having an advisory committee to the subject-matter expert committee, developing a scope of practice, and that is going to have representatives from other certifications, it's going to have representatives from service providers, and we hope, and are inviting, one of the members of that committee to also represent ACB. 
	So, you know, I think that the times are changing in the way that we need to think about our process and the feedback has been helpful and we're doing our best to broaden the feedback that we receive.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you.  And Lauren Branch, is there a question that you would like to ask of your fellow panelists or any additional comments?  
	>> LAUREN BRANCH:  I just have a couple of comments and it's related to the comments others have made about this VSA project.  So if you don't know, I'm also the current chairperson of VisionServe Alliance, and this reimbursement issue is very near and dear to my heart.  So I think one of the challenges that other people have expressed in terms of recruiting people to the field is around the pay disparities between some of the professionals and how we get reimbursed in this field.  
So I think we have a tremendous opportunity, and the timing is right, to be able to try to move this forward and get all of our professionals in vision rehabilitation, somehow reimbursed through our Medicare and Medicaid services and, you know, so we fully support the efforts that are going on in that arena and really hope that you can help support those efforts as well.  I do think that legislative changes to the Older Americans Act would be helpful. 
	We are working on some pilots here in Oklahoma and have some success that we're hoping to be able to share with some of our colleagues around the country in terms of utilizing -- utilizing the data that we have and the information that we know regarding our services help mitigate some of the adverse outcomes that people are having who aren't receiving vision rehabilitation services, particularly in the areas of, you know, independent living, being able to stay safe in their homes, medication management, fall prevention, et cetera.  
And, you know, in taking that information and working with insurance providers rather than on a fee-for-service model, but in some of the alternative payment methods and, you know, looking at investment in our services on the front end can help reduce costs on the back end.  You know, for insurance companies and other providers and hoping that we can use that information to get by some pilot programs that would prove out the value of the services that we're providing in a positive way and be able to exhibit return on investment which then drives their willingness and eagerness to provide reimbursement for the services that we're providing. 
	And I think that's a challenge.  You mentioned, you know, if agencies paid more, they would attract more workers to the field.  But as nonprofit agencies, private agencies out here in the field, and I've even seen it with state agencies, with low reimbursement rates or no reimbursement for these services, it's very difficult to fundraise into sustainment and growth in these services.  So I think the funding is a critical piece of the conversations that we're having and I think could drive change within our service providers.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Great, thank you, Lauren.  At this point, I'd like to turn to our audience members.  We've already had some folks at microphones in the room.  Waiting patiently, I might add.  So we will take a couple of questions here from the room.  And then we'll take a couple of questions from Zoom.  
	>> CHANELLE ALLEN:  We have -- 
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Okay.  Marcia Farrell.  
	>> I am a certified rehabilitation specialist, 20 years, second career for me.  I went into the field because of the shortage and I'm so glad you are all here at the table.  I've been losing 20 years of sleep because of this.  This is not new.  This has been going on and ignored.  I'm not saying on purpose.  But we've been out here in Georgia, beating the bushes, beating our legislators over the head.  Money is a terrible problem.  If it wasn't for my state retirement, I would have starved to death already.  People leave the private sector, go to the VA, they can work there, make twice, three times as much as we make in an agency.  And the OTs in Georgia make $80,000 a year.  We make about a third of that.  On a good day.  On a good day. 
	Most of us -- and this is truly honest -- we volunteer a huge amount of our time.  Those who are visually impaired that want to work can't find a driver, transportation, they lose their job, because visually impaired people can't get around to the homes.  It's a crisis.  And I can't speak for these states who have commissions and other nice things, but in rural states like ours, we have so little that we're sending our people to NFB centers, and that's how they're getting their training. 
	I know we spent about $20,000 per client to go to Colorado, Louisiana.  So we're going out of state to train our people.  And I have to say, thank you, NFB.  Otherwise, they would have nothing.  I could say more, but I'll allow others to share their comments.  
	>> Mike.  
	>> Thank you, Clark.  I just want to bring to all the affiliates' attention, we need to work on licensing within our states so that the doctors will begin to recognize VRTs as licensed professionals within our states and make those referrals.  We're dancing around the money issue early on in this presentation and finally got down to that bottom line at the end of this presentation.  We need to make sure that the VRTs are licensed within all of our states so that the VRTs will be receiving referrals from the medical model because they are providing the services that we need and the only way that we can raise the amount of services provided is by raising the need.  And when the doctors stop shrugging their shoulders because there are no licensed professionals out there providing the services, that they can recognize, we need to make sure that the doctors will make those referrals. 
	So I challenge all the affiliates in the room to get out there and make sure that the VRTs are licensed within their state.  New York state has been working on it for 20 years.  We'll get it done eventually.  Thank you.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Michael Byington.  We're going to take a pause in the room.  We just took two from the room.  Are there questions in Zoom?  
	>> CHANELLE ALLEN:  Yes, Margie D.  
	>> MARGIE:  Good morning, ACB, this is a subject near and dear to my heart.  37 years ago when I completed the program at San Francisco state university which only held for three years, I chose my internship at Palo Alto VA, and my internship hours went towards my career.  My full career was spent with the VA.  The VA has figured out ways to continuously hire people.  Palo Alto had a huge struggle in the cost of living.  They figured out how to go above the cost-of-living area adjustment.  Until we address the financial issues in this field with not-for-profits, we will continue to have a discrepancy.  People are going to the VA.  They're not going to community agencies.  Until we figure how to get reimbursed by insurance companies for non-VA employees, we will continue to have a problem.  
I will make one last statement.  I worked with two OTs in San Francisco as a VIS coordinator.  One was at a local hospital who referred all of her veterans to me.  She knew she could not do the job. 
	We worked with an OT as at a state veterans.  When Florida sent the instructor out, she got certified.  We need our OTs to get certified in vision therapy, OLM, all the areas for blind to be providing these services.  Thank you.  [Cheering and Applause] 
	>> TED CHITTENDEN:  Thank you for taking my question.  This is Ted.  My question is to Lauren, which is, are there any political considerations other than financial ones, for why licensed VRPs are not coming to the state of Oklahoma?  Thank you.  
	>> LAUREN BRANCH:  You know what, number one, I think that Oklahoma forever has been viewed as kind of a flyover state and not terribly attractive for individuals to move to. 
	You know, I think too, there are people who may not be interested in coming to Oklahoma because of some of the politics here, you know, regardless of, you know, where you stand.  I mean, there's been some, you know, we all hear on the national news, you know, various sound bites that may for some make it unattractive. 
	But the reality of it is, a lot of people, you know, who are going through the programs tend to stay close to home.  And, you know, are not relocating to the more rural areas, you know, and so -- and I think, too, that there's obviously -- there's such a shortage that there's competition, you know, for those positions and people who come out as a couple of people have alluded to, you know, the VA has figured this out.  I mean, they understand the value of the services.  They pay the people to provide the service.  
I think with the competition out there, the people coming out of the programs are really able to pick and choose where they -- you know, where they go to work.  And I think that we've got to, you know, elevate our field to the level that we're treated like everyone else.  I mean, you know, when I talk to, you know, legislators, I use the VA as an example.  When we get a veteran here in, you know, in through our clinic, they've hit the jackpot, right?  They can get any service, any device, anything, anything that they want.  And so, you know, I think it's so -- you know, we're put on a level playing field.  We're paying money to attract people into the field. 
	I will say, though, that we in Oklahoma tried for a number of years to work with our historically Black college here to try to stand up a program here in Oklahoma at the bachelor's level for VRT.  We have been working with ACVREP to do that.  The university was on board, but then you get into who is going to fund these programs, who is going to teach these programs, right?  I mean, they wanted us, then, to provide the staff to be able to teach the programs.  Well, we're providing services and so, you know, where are the people who can teach these programs as well?  We've seen programs over the last 20 years.  We know there are programs in danger of existing in perpetuity because we don't have professionals coming in behind to take those programs over and administer.  It's a very, very complicated issue.  I'm very thankful that we're having this discussion this morning.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you for sharing that perspective as well.  Folks, we are nearing the end of this session, so we will not take any more questions or comments from the audience. 
	Lauren, in wrapping up this session here, we have about five minutes and five panelists and it works out kind of nicely.  Is there anything in addition you'd like to say what you just shared?  That sounds like a closing argument, but I'll ask if there's anything you'd like to share as we come to a close for what is hopefully the first and not the only conversation on this topic.  
	>> LAUREN BRANCH:  The only thing I have to say, I appreciate ACB's willingness to take on this issue and have this panel discussion.  I think that, you know, as a number of people have mentioned, we, as stakeholder, and the broader group, need to be honest and open and transparent and engage in these types of discussions to find the solutions moving forward.  And so I congratulate you, ACB, on taking on this very difficult but necessary conversation.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Lauren.  Next I'll turn it to Lee Sonnenberg.  
	>> LEE SONNENBERG:  I guess in summary, I do appreciate ACB taking on this discussion with this panel.  I'm looking forward to this summit where we all come together to start discussing these issues.  I think it's very important, and the consensus needs to be there and everyone needs to be at the table to discussing that so we can move forward as a community.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Lee.  Now, I'd like to turn it to Jamie Dean for closing thoughts.  And also, a thank you to ACVREP for helping give us the impetus to bring this panel together.  [Laughter].  
	>> JAMIE DEAN:  I like the other panelists appreciate ACB having the conversation.  Obviously, ACVREP and ACB have already worked closely together on issues like the audio describer certification and we appreciate your partnership.  And I appreciate your willingness to have hard conversations in a respectful, professional way.  That's how we grow.  It's how we learn.  So I do value that and as an organization, we welcome that.  I think we're at a time when all of us need to be thinking entrepreneurially, there's a lot of things to cover and we can't continue to do things the way we have the last five decades because the territory is getting bigger and the problems aren't getting covered.  Being a change-maker, innovator, and quick to be an innovator and slow to worry about the things outside of our control, so be an innovator is my last message.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, now I'll turn to Lori Scharff for last thoughts.  
	>> LORI SCHARFF:  Doug and I think we should use this as a fundraiser.  The task force as ACB sponsored a community event that was an hour and a half long where we spoke with an occupational therapist and mom of a DeafBlind child who became certified as a CVRT and coms as well as others in the field and I look forward to having further discussion on this.  Thank you.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Lori, and I'll turn to Doug Powell to bring us home.  
	>> DOUG POWELL:  Lori wants me to say that it was podcasted so you can pick it up on the ACB podcasts. 
	All I have to say is, let's get this thing moving.  People are still waiting around for services.  The sooner we can get the summit going, the sooner we can talk about the solutions and implementing some stuff that will allow people to live the kinds of lives that we want to live.  
	>> CLARK RACHFAL:  Thank you, Doug.  I teased Jamie and ACVREP earlier, but I do want to thank them for bringing this issue to the forefront and thank all of the panelists for sharing their perspectives.  We brought this about because of the certification, the visual certification for occupational therapists, but as you heard, the issue is much deeper.  We need funding and trained professionals to make sure that all who are blind, DeafBlind can live at integrated members of their community.  So thank you to our partners and thank you to everyone attending the session today, and I'll hand it back over to Kim Charlson.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Thank you, and I want to thank Clark for a masterful job of bringing these people together for a truly informative, thought-provoking panel that I think is just the first of many steps in the 91 boxes that Doug is going to be famous for now, as we're all using that as our analogy.  I want to have the door prize people get ready and I'll be back to you in a couple of seconds and you can tell me how many door prizes we have.  We're going to have a break.  But again, for our Zoom people, Lauren, Jamie, thank you so much for participating with us today.  This is such a critical issue.  And I want to thank all of you in the audience, both live and on Zoom.  This is a complicated issue.  You probably heard enough alphabet soup to fill a bowl today, but you're going to have to learn the alphabet in this context because we need to do everything we can to help those people out there not getting service and this is the first step in something that is long overdue.  It should have happened long ago.  It's got to happen now to give those people a chance to live an independent life.  So thank you, everyone. 
	Door prizes!  
	>> Hi, everyone, we're going to do two now and then a couple after break and some at the end.  Our first door prize is a $20 -- a $20 donated by the Austin Council of the Blind and our winner is Virginia Debaley, and she is virtual.  
	>> Okay.  Let's give her a hand, everybody.  
	>> Virginia Debaley.  Our second and what will happen with virtual, we will mail the prizes to her. 
	Okay.  Our next one is burger cookies, donated by the Maryland Council of the Blind, and the winner of this prize is here, name of Allison Smitherman.  Yay, all right.  Okay.  So I will come back after break with more door prizes.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Thank you so much, and we're going to have a short break, about ten minutes, but do come back because we're going to talk all about audio description.  
	>> Can I make an announcement real quick?  This is D.J.  McIntyre, and my mom has [indiscernible] for $10 a bag, if anyone wants to, it funds our local Lions club.  We have fresh pecans at the table.  
	>> This is Alan.  I know what you have.  
	>> I have Braille form raffle tickets.  I'd like to sell a few.  If you are in the market for a Braille form raffle ticket, I've got them.  
	>> Alan is up towards the front in the North Dakota delegation area.  Ohio and North Dakota.  We will take a brief break at 10:30.  
	>> We're going to mute the conference on break so we don't pick up any embarrassing or inappropriate conversation.  [Break] 
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Convention dog, that's probably mine.  Maybe she'll pick up something for me while she's going to exhibits.  Let's have door prizes.  Somebody grabbed her.  Thank you so much.  To the rescue!  I had her tethered, too.  She's a smart dog. 
	All right.  Can we have our door prizes?  You might need a microphone.  
	>> Today we have for our next door prizes we have $50 Visa card from the ACB Radio Amateurs, and the winner of that is Kenneth Semien.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Our next one is a $25 Visa card from Wauconda lions, and Shadeeg, virtual.  Shall we do one more?  
	>> Let's do one more.  
	>> I agree.  The next one is $20 -- $20, again, by Austin Council of the Blind and this man is also virtual, his name is Jeffrey Proscko, and he is virtual.  
	>> Let's give congratulations to our winners and thank you for the door prizes!  Much appreciated. 
	So our next program on the schedule today is one that is especially important to me.  I have the honor of serving ACB as the co-chair of the Audio Description Project, one of ACB's major initiatives, program initiatives, and I serve as co-chair with Carl Richardson, who is from the Boston area as well, and a large group of volunteers that served on the six committees for the Audio Description Project, one of which is the audio description award -- project awards committee.  So that's what we're going to focus on today, but the other committees, including media, performing arts, museums and parks, the benefits of audio description for children, our section 508 committee and our awards gala committee.  
There is a lot of people involved in all aspects of the Audio Description Project and to help us do the work we do, we're fortunate to have Tabitha on our staff at ACB, and as contractors for -- with ADP, we have Joel Snyder, who many of you know from his long service with ACB as our founder and senior consultant to the Audio Description Project, for our ADP.ACB.org, and Timothy Wynn, who finds out what's on TV and posts it to the website, every week.  He keeps track of that so you all will know what you can watch with audio description.  
So it's my pleasure today to introduce the video and you're going to immediate Jeff Thom, the ADP awards committee chair, and Tabitha, our coordinator, as they present to you the class of 2023 audio description award winners.  
	>> ACB presents the 2023 Audio Description Project achievement awards in audio description.  Tabitha Kenlon, the coordinator.  
	>> Brought to you by the ADP awards, brought to you by the American Council of the Blind Audio Description Project.  I'm Tabitha Kenlon, and I'm joined by Jeff Thom, the chair of the ADP awards committee.  Jeff, can you tell us about it?  
	>> Jeff Thom, ACB awards committee chair.  
	>> They make outstanding quality, availability, audio description, recognize achievement in audio description in the performing arts, museums, the public sector, research and development, and career achievement.  
	>> Achievement in audio description media/individual.  
	>> Thank you, Jeff.  Our first award is for -- media by an individual.  The winner is Debra Erickson, executive chef and founder of The Blind Kitchen which provides accessible cooking tools and kits to help people who are blind or have low vision cook safely, independently, and confidently.  On The Blind Kitchen YouTube channel, audio described videos that explain in detail how to use each tool that is sold on The Blind Kitchen site.  The nomination praised Debra for exemplifying the standards that we as a community deserve from all YouTube channels, by including audio description, The Blind Kitchen respects the needs for the company in providing equal access and sets the benchmark for others to follow.  Congratulations, Debra.  
	>> White frosting appears against the black background, looking soon more -- [Music]  The visual cupcake on the letters -- replaced by the language and logo, TBK.  
	>> Debra Erickson, welcome to The Blind Kitchen where everyone gets a seat at the table, I'm Debra Erickson and I am honored to accept this award from the Audio Description Project.  Since its inception, The Blind Kitchen has wanted to provide adaptive tools and strategies for people with vision loss who wanted to cook and we wanted to make sure that every portion of The Blind Kitchen was accessible to everyone, regardless of their position on the vision spectrum.  I owe a special thank you to my videographer, Edgar Chavez, and he was not only talented but has a special gift to listen to a blind entrepreneur convey what I wanted The Blind Kitchen to be and he was able to translate that into a product that now has been recognized and he knows he did a very good job. 
	Again, thank you so much for this honor.  We really appreciate it and are humbled by it.  
	>> Achievement in audio description, visual art museums, visit centers, individual.  Our next is for achievement in museums by an individual.  The winner is Karen Bergman, her ability tours reached a wider audience when so many things moved online due to the pandemic lockdown.  In fact, Karen was dominated for this award by a Canadian artist who is blind and said she was, quote, culturally enriched by the skills and competence of Karin's description of countless arts at the Guggenheim and her ability to describe art to blind patrons is, in the nominator's opinion, unsurpassed, and to the described art experience.  According to the nominator, its creative soul.  Congratulations, Karen.  
	>> Karen Bergman, Guggenheim.  
	>> Thank you for this great honor, I host a program with the description of the many facets of art and I want to express a deep thanks to the participants who attend and bring a rich exchange of thoughts each week.  This dedicated individuals, anchored me for years now based to look more closely, understand more fully, and turn my own craft into -- I'm so thankful for this opportunity through description to champion the work of artists and architecture.  Thank you for this great honor.  
	>> Achievement in audio description, visual arts, museums, visitor centers, organization.  Next we recognize achievements in museums by an organization.  The winner is the North Carolina museum of art for adults who are blind, have low vision or a learning need that would benefit from a sensory style experience.  Registrants receive a small kit of objects to awaken the senses and connect deeper to the artwork.  Audio descriptioning and captioning is divided, the interactivity and the responsiveness of the staff, saying, I did not realize how much I craved hearing the details of an artwork until I went on my first journey.  She expected the feedback and providing the description in advance after being asked to do so.  Here to accept the award are Molly Hull and Felicia Ingram, manager of accessibility interpretation and diversity.  Congratulations, Molly, Felicia, and everyone at the North Carolina museum of art.  
	>> FELICIA:  My name is Felicia, I'm a white woman in my late 20s, I have long dark hair, I have red glasses on.  
	>> Molly Hull, North Carolina museum of art.  
	>> MOLLY:  I'm Molly, a white woman in my late 20s with curly brown hair and I am wearing a red shirt.  
	>> FELICIA:  We want to thank the Audio Description Project and we are honored to receive this award.  We want to thank our staff which includes those that help facilitate the program.  Bre worked with me back in 2020 to bring this into her set of programs.  And create an experience that everyone could participate in, especially right in the midst of COVID of 2020.  And then I want to thank Molly, who came on later, and she really helped to build this beautiful program and make it what it is today and she continues to strive to make it better.  
	>> MOLLY:  Second, we would like to thank art access, which is a North Carolina nonprofit that is dedicated to providing North Carolinians access to art.  
	>> FELICIA:  We also want to thank the stakeholder committee, 30 members from the communities, either with disabilities or children with disabilities and in the surrounding cities of the triangle -- Raleigh, Durham, Capitol Hill, and we valued their feedback and they are evaluation of the program.  So not only do we work with them to help make the program better, but they are a big part of our outreach and I don't think we would have as big a following without so many stakeholder members and we often have recurring members that come every other month and they constantly come and they are a big part of the outreach and reaching the community, so we want to thank that stakeholder committee for us.  
	>> MOLLY:  Last, but certainly not least, the participants of this program who are our advocates for the sensory journey as well as the museum, your constant support allows us to continue to expand and improve our efforts, and without you, this program would not be what it is today.  If you have never attended our journey, we invite you to attend our website and register.  Thank you.  
	>> FELICIA:  Thank you.  
	>> Special achievement in museums.  
	>> This year, the committee decided to also give an award recognizing special achievement in museums.  The winner is Dr. Michelle Edwards from the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington DC, which is the only national museum to the documentation of African American life, history, and culture.  Dr. Edwards developed a series of virtual living history tour programs called History Alive.  They were the museum's first virtual tour programs to include video with an audio description track.  The programs include a look at the last five years of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s life, and how they continued to fight for freedom once they returned to the U.S.  The history alive are able to stream on the history and YouTube channels.  Dr. Edwards is currently working on the next History Alive, called sports, level the playing field.  
	>> Dr. Michelle Edwards, National Museum of African American history and culture.  
	>> I'd like to thank American Council of the Blind for the 2023 for special achievements in museums.  The National Museum of African American history and culture is open to all where anyone is welcome to participate, collaborate, and learn about the Black experience in America.  During our history live programs, we hear about the African American experience, freedoms, self-determination, citizenship, valor, and much, much more.  Described the immersive learning experience for those who may not be able to travel or physically access the museum.  I'm grateful to work with a wonderful team of individuals on this project.  First and foremost, I'd like to thank historian John Pascal for the history living presentation, the videography work and the senior leadership team for supporting the program.  I would like to offer a special thanks to Esther Washington, Cassie Moses, Keith Madden, Adam Rasmussen for helping me on the project.  The Smithsonian initiative challenges the Smithsonian to challenge diversity, equity, inclusion in our workforce and external scholarship.  Last, I'd like to offer my thanks to Beth and Ashley Grady from Smithsonian access programs for making themselves available to answer my many questions about how to make our virtual tours accessible by way of audio description.  Receiving this award means so much to me.  Thanks again, for I am truly honored.  
	>> Achievement in audio description performing arts/individual, and now, it's time to get dramatic.  For achievements in the performing arts by an individual, our winner is Bonnie Barlow, Bonnie has provided live description for more than 258 plays and events from Amadeus to The Kid, Bonnie consults with theaters across the country, helping them launch their own audio description programs.  The nominator praised Bonnie's skill, for descriptions become part of the richness of the performance rather than distracting from the performance. 
	Another nominator commended Bonnie's Willingness to training new audio describers, includes the ballet, film, TV streaming series and even the rodeo.  Congratulations, Bonnie.  
	>> Bonnie Barlow, audio describer.  
	>> Thanks for giving me this award.  For all of these years performing arts are especially important to me because that's how we, as a society, explore.  We ask questions, form ideas, test out theories, age the results and reactions, and then continue the discussion.  My part is fulfilled by recognizing and relaying everything the theaters put into their piece.  It's a way to transport us from our usual -- consider other viewpoints and look at others' bias.  So it's a form of social media we've employed over the centuries, and with audio description and all of its aspect, there's always something that comes along where we have to get creative.  I strive to relay an experience, not just information.  And I must be doing something all right, so I will keep on keeping on and thank you again so much for this honor.  
	>> Achievement in audio description performing arts/organization.  For achievement in performing arts by an organization, our winner is the Smith Center for the performing arts in Las Vegas.  Prior to the opening of the Smith Center, the nominator did not have consistent access to audio description for performing arts.  The Smith Center provides audio description at the Broadway series, saying, they truly care about the quality of their work or their audio description.  Before the show, they meet with patrons to confirm their performance on how descriptive they should be.  They even come visit during intermission to take notes and guidance for the remainder of the show.  In a heartfelt endorsement, the nominators include my experience with the Smith Center and all of its employees has been a highlight that I never thought I would be able to experience.  They are a huge staple in our community, and their continued efforts at accessibility only makes them that much better and more deserving of this award.  Here to accept the award is Sara Teaming, Smith Center manager of guest experience.  Thank you, Sara, and everyone at the Smith Center.  
	>> Sara Thielman, thank you from the bottom of my heart for achieving the 2023 audio description award.  I'm humbled, grateful, and deeply moved by this recognition of my work in the field of audio description.  When I embarked on this journey, little did I know it would lead to receiving this award, inclusivity and storytelling to reach every single person regardless of their visual abilities.  I want to thank Smith Center and our audio description team to make it an essential part of our cultural landscape.  The dedication of our describers have paved the way for more inclusive experience.  I am proud to be a part of this remarkable team.  To the visually impaired community, you have showed us that barriers can be broken, and your passion for storytelling drives us for the best audio description possible.  Your feedback and unwavering supports have been instrumental in shaping the field of audio description and I am grateful for your trust.  Receiving this award is a humbling reminder of the impact that audio description can have on individuals and societies, to experience the magic of storytelling.  Thank you for this extraordinary honor.  I accept on behalf of the Smith Center for the performing arts and our dedicated team of audio describers.  Thank you.  
	>> Audio Description Project public sector award.  
	>> It's okay because now we're going to outer space.  The public sector award goes to the space telescope science institute.  As a federal contractor to NASA, the institute, or STSCI, the most famous observations in history, the Hubbell and the James Webb telescopes, actions STSCI embark on a project to describe the universe using the data transmitted from the James Webb telescope.  A team of scientists and writers combined their skills to describe planetary objects, galaxies, and star clusters.  The STSCI staff also created tactile representatives of the Webb telescope data for low vision so enthusiasts could touch the universe.  Here to accept the award, Timothy Wu.  Congratulations, Margaret, Tim, and everyone at the Space Telescope Science Institute.  
	>> Timothy Rhue.  
	>> Hi, my name is Tim Rhue, here at the space science institute here in Maryland.  
	>> Margaret Carruthers, I am writing and design here at STSCI.  
	>> On behalf of everyone here at space telescope, thank you.  We are delighted to be recipients of this award.  
	>> So this time last year we were working to share the data from the James Webb telescope from the world and try to describe the spectacular images of parts of the universe that no one had seen in such detail before and we knew our efforts would not be complete without audio descriptions, but most of us had little idea of knowing how many we would reach and the impact, and we have been overwhelmed from stories of people reaching the stars.  
	>> This is the work of not just one or two people, but creating images to make sure that everyone has access requires writers, astronomers, software developers, web contact managers, including blind and visually impaired people, and provided essential people to help us build the skills.  
	>> And finally, we want to thank all of you for all the acknowledgements, encouragement, and feedback.  Our commitment to this work has really been galvanized from the response of the members of the blind and visually impaired community.  It's accelerated our efforts for rich and detailed description for all of the Hubbell and Webb imagery, and it's helping us increase accessibility for all of our work.  
	>> Once again, thank you so much for this award, for marking one more successful step towards making astronomy accessible to all.  We hope to continue to make you proud as we discover the universe together.  
	>> This time, it's across the pond, for the international award, which goes to movie reading, has developed a unique technology for reading access to individuals in any theater without technological change or additional charge.  Audio description and captioning can be downloaded to a patron's individual device.  The assets can be used for cinema, broadcast, and video on demand content.  Based in Italy, movie reading is also in Brazil, France, and northern European Union countries, to improve content security for all distribution and production companies and major organizations.  The service is completely free of charge for all blind and Deaf patrons worldwide.  Movie reading is a product of universe multimedia access which is part of an access group that includes arts project and the nonprofit organization, cultural ability.  This group has worked for more than 15 years to improve access to cinema, television, theater, and culture, for people with sensory disabilities.  Here to accept the award, congratulations, everyone at movie reading.  
	>> Movie reading, Giacomo.  
	>> I want to thank you for recognizing the work that we have done.  It is sometimes difficult to -- it gives me joy and pride that we have been selected for the ACB award.  [Indiscernible].  Working on -- must continue our efforts of accessibility to all who need it.  And then the -- working.  I would like to thank my [indiscernible] those who have played a critical role in our success.  [Indiscernible] make sure to become an international reality.  I would like to acknowledge the hard work and the dedication of the people at the project in Italy and [indiscernible] qualities that -- and we are grateful for the partnership.  I would also like to express my gratitude for the partner [indiscernible] to all who worked on this and I look forward to continuing to work together.  I would like to offer a special thanks for those -- [indiscernible].  Their cooperation was ensuring -- [indiscernible].  Look forward to continuing working together.  Lastly, I would like to expand -- to our partner [indiscernible] and his company in Sweden, becoming the company we are today.  On behalf of everyone I have mentioned, I would like to also again express our deepest gratitude to the American Council of the Blind for recognizing our work.  Thank you, and we will continue our work to make a more inclusive place.  
	>> Our final award is the Barry Lavine memorial award in audio description, outstanding contributions to the field of audio description over and extended period of time, by reading, inspiring, or providing -- the winner is Dr. Joshua Melay, who is blind, worked as an adaptive designer, effective and affordable solutions to everyday accessibility problems.  Access to graphics and streaming video.  His described platform combines audio descriptions of YouTube videos with an interface to synchronize the descriptive audio with the video.  The nominator pointed out that the doctor's expertise in information accessibility and his commitment to making solutions available will be increasingly important as we move into an ever-more digitized word.  Congratulations.  
	>> You describe.  
	>> Thank you so much, Tabitha.  I am deeply flattered and honored to be given this award.  It is -- it is my -- I'm just thrilled.  I can't tell you how much I appreciate it, appreciate the work of the ACB and the Audio Description Project.  I just want to look back for a minute and say that it's ten years since we've officially released you describe to the world and allow people to use a platform to allow audio description to any YouTube video they wanted to share it with the world for free.  That changed the landscape of audio description and whose voices were being heard, who was writing the scripts, who was choosing the material to be described.  It was the first time, really, that we brought social media and audio description together in a meaningful way.  I hope that some of the lessons that we've learned from you describe have been brought to the audio description that we now all need so much.  
So I am blind.  I am coming at audio description from the perspective of a dedicated consumer, and since my time at Smith commonwell developing you describe with a large team of others who all deserve lots of credit and appreciation, since that time, I have moved on to be a researcher at Amazon and my motivation there is really to be able to work on accessibility at scale at Amazon scale, and that includes my hopes for audio description.  Amazon currently offers more audio description than any other streaming platform.  Which is something to be extremely proud of.  I'm extremely proud of that and I have had -- it's been my pleasure to work with the audio description teams on prime video and Amazon Studios to achieve that.  
But quantity is not sufficient.  We are also committed to delivering quality audio description and to understanding explicitly what that means and how to do it in a measurable and repeatable way.  And that is -- that is super important.  I have a dream that someday audio description will be as ubiquitous as captions, and we are poised on the brink of achieving -- achieving that.  We're not there yet.  And it's going to take a while.  
And I just want to say, you know, a lifetime achievement award sounds like -- it sounds like I'm done, as we say at Amazon, it is still daylight and there's an enormous amount of work left to do in bringing audio description to more people on more platforms, making sure that it is at the highest quality with all possible options.  Our audio description is essential.  I've always believed that audio description is as important as access to text, to maps, to graphics, to other information, and that audio description needs to be high quality in order to be meaningful.  And I just want to say a final absolute thank you to the ACB and the Audio Description Project for keeping -- for bearing the torch of audio description through the years, for making sure that folks like me and corporation like Amazon are aware of the importance of audio description to blind consumers, blind viewers, and that keeping -- keeping everyone accountable for how audio description needs to be done and the quality at which blind consumers expect it to be delivered.  
So thank you to the ACB and to the Audio Description Project and thank you again for the honor of the Barry Levine lifetime achievement award in audio description.  
	>> Those are the 2023 audio description awards.  Along with Tabitha, we have Dan Spoone, Carl Richardson, Shawn Berry.  Our thanks to everyone who submitted nominations and of course to our great award winners.  It's great to know that so many people are working hard to provide and improve audio description across the country, around the world, in cyber space and outer space.  We hope you enjoy audio description wherever you find it.  
	>> Here is Susan to tell you all about it.  BADIE, benefits of audio description in education.  Susan Glass.  
	>> Hello, ACB, my name is Susan Glass, and since 2013, it's been my honor and privilege to chair ACB's Audio Description Project, Benefits of Audio Description In Education, BADIE, the description and captioned media project, the BADIE contest in which children ages 7 to 21 watched an audio described film of their choice and wrote an evaluation.  They shared specific ways in which it enhanced or detracted from their experience with the film.  Members of our BADIE committee read all entries and the grand prize winner receives an iPad Mini and an invitation to read their review at either ACB's mid-year review or the annual conference and convention.  This year's grand prize winner is Ms. May Lane-Karnas.  She reviewed Tim Burton's TV series, "Wednesday," and she will now share her review.  
	>> Thank you so much, American Council of the Blind, and the described and captioned media program for cosponsoring this on the benefits of audio description in education.  I'm Katie, homeschooling parent to my daughter, 13-year-old May.  May was diagnosed with CVI, cortico cerebral -- up until spending her life realizing that her challenges were due to a brain-based blindness.  It was frustrating and anxiety provoking and really impossible for May without accommodations.  Her optometrist suggest she try audio descriptions.  It helped her but let us know how much May had been missing.  We went to Braille instruction and May took off.  Audio descriptions, remodels, code, Braille literacy, robust, has given May real access to her education and confidence in herself.  It has been a wonderful experience for May to explore, the self-advocacy, written analysis.  It is my pleasure to introduce 13-year-old May reading her essay that she wrote, after just 18 months of access to audio description and Braille.  
	>> May Lane-Karnas.  
	>> You know it's a great audio description when you have no access to it.  It should fit perfectly in the cracks of the story so you could get swept up in the story without having to think of them as extra.  Director Tim Burton on "Wednesday" has clear and concise audio descriptions that gives you a perfect amount of information with the time allotted, they point a clear picture of what is going on and match the overall tone of the program.  They fit perfectly in the cracks.  At the same time, I wish I had more time to talk about the visual nuances and storytelling Tim Burton is known for.  One of the most appealing characters of Wednesday Addams is that she has a down tilted head with eye staring at the eyebrows throughout the TV show.  The amount of emotion in her browse alone is so subtle and impactful and I don't feel we got adequate access to a blind audience.  There is also a lot of visual symbolism, clues, and the murder mystery access to the show that I don't think we get access to either.  I feel quite sad about that.  This has become one of my favorite TV shows because of the access, audio descriptions have provided.  At the same time, I want access to more artistic and visually nuanced elements sighted fans get to enjoy.  
	>> The logo, ACB, in print and Braille, American Council of the Blind, together for a bright future.  [Cheering and Applause] 
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Wow.  What can you say after that?  What a talented young woman, from 13, and 18 months of Braille instruction.  That is phenomenal.  Let's have one more round of applause for all of our winners today, and yay to the Audio Description Project!  
So excuse me.  I want to give you an update to the runaway Idabel dog.  She was about four feet away.  I'd have moved my chair, her leash came unhooked from the leg of the chair, and she was next to the other chair sleeping, which she does often because she thinks I'm boring.  She never went anywhere.  She was four feet away from me the whole time.  So she is back. 
	Oh, there was an actual run away.  It wasn't mine, though.  I'm thrilled to introduce the next speakers from Be My Eyes.  I love the virtual assistance and can't wait to hear what Mike Buckley, who is the chairman and CEO for Be My Eyes, from San Mateo, California, has to tell us, along with Christian Erfurt, cofounder and chief evangelist from Denmark.  We're so excited to hear what you have to tell us.  Or in Zoom -- they're in Zoom.  Okay.  
	>> CHANELLE ALLEN:  They are not on the panelist or attendee side.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Oh, no!  Can we call Be My Eyes and see if we can find them?  I had heard rumors that perhaps there were some travel problems for Mike.  He was supposed to be on Zoom.  Well, I can't whisk him up as magic.  I do apologize for such a lost in our program, because I was looking forward to it.  I do love the virtual assistant for those of you gradually brought into the virtual assistance and have access on Be My Eyes.  It's fabulous.  I'll just tell you one story.  I did some wayfinding consultation with the Boston Aquarium, and I walked into the aquarium.  You can imagine the aquarium isn't the easiest place to make accessible, because it's behind glass and it better stay that way or we're in trouble.  But I took out Be My Eyes and it told my I was in front of the penguin habitat and there was one penguin off to the side and the others were on the other end, so I was curious.  Why would there be one penguin all alone?  Maybe he's the loner of the group.  And he told me it was an African penguin.  I enjoyed that very much, and just -- I'm always finding new ways to use virtual assistance and it's just an amazing way that AI technology can help us. 
	Again, my regrets, and I'm so sorry they are not here with us.  We're checking on it.  And I will -- in the interim, will update you in a couple of moments but would like to take any announcements that people might have before -- while we're checking.  Mike Buckley.  So we're still checking Zoom.  If anyone has an announcement -- 
	>> Yep, I got one.  
	>> Okay, Ray.  
	>> RAY CAMPBELL:  Good morning, Ray Campbell, Illinois Council of the Blind.  In case you thought it was too late to buy a raffle ticket from us, it's certainly not.  50% of the pot that we'll be selling from now until Labor Day, we'll draw September 9th, I believe our [indiscernible] has gone home from our exhibit, but you can still get your 50/50 tickets.  Several of us have them at the Illinois table.  You can also contact our office by telephone at 217-523-4967 to purchase them or you can go online, www.ICBonline.org, the raffle.  $5 each, $5 for $20, the last few years the winner has taken home around $900, so it's well worth it.  Thank you so much.  
	>> I'd like to recognize gene to tell us about MMS.  
	>> If you did not miss the tour booth, we have coverage all the time, you can either go to the registration office and fill out a form there or you can call 888-999-3190 or you can email at ACBmms@Gmail.com.  If you do this by the end of the weekend, I will get in touch with you after we all get home and -- a $300 Amazon gift card, a $250 Amazon gift card or one of two $100 Amazon gift cards.  So all you need to do, if you're not already a member, is donate a minimum of $10 a month, half of which can go back to the affiliate of your choice.  It comes out of your checking account or gets charged to a credit card, and even if you are already a member, you can increase your donation by a minimum of $5 a month and you will be eligible.  So thank you very much and we hope to hear from more of you.  
	>> Madam Chair.  
	>> First time going to check on Alan Peterson.  Marcia.  
	>> Georgia Council of the Blind still has the cow patty bingo.  The cow is the answer.  
	>> Kim, this is Alan.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  I want a progress report.  
	>> I have four tickets left.  The registration desk has about 50, 60.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Okay.  Well, you still have a chance to get it ticket from Alan for the registration.  Thank you, Alan.  
	>> Madam Chair.  
	>> Is that Carl?  
	>> CARL:  Yes.  
	>> She and I both co-chaired the audio description and we are showing two best-picture winners.  7:30.  The first one would be CODA, which stands for Child of a Deaf Adult, and that's about the Deaf community, and it's an amazing picture of audio description differently, because there are times when there's no dialogue going on because it's Deaf people signing to each other, so they had to hire talent, but it's a very emotional movie.  Bring your tissue box.  And then the last, the second movie is "Everything, Everywhere, All At Once," which is a very good picture, and tonight is a chance to be entertained and watch two best-picture winners with audio descriptions.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  I don't remember where that is.  It's in here, in the ballroom, for the big screen, that's right, for those who want to look at it.  Is it ticketed?  You can pay at the door.  The contribution at the door helps to cover refreshments.  We're going to have popcorn and refreshments so you can really enjoy yourselves and I think it's $10 at the door.  
	>> No word on Zoom?  
	>> ANTHONY:  Madam Chair, it's Anthony Corona.  We have the accessible -- [indiscernible] accessible origami, outside of the marketplace.  She also designs jewelry.  A lot of it is LGBTQ+ themed.  Magnetic jewelry and slushies and if you don't see her today, you can see her in the BCI.  So come visit origami.  It's going to be awesome.  
	>> I'm asking for Debra, she wants to know if you'd like to do another door prize.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  I would love to do another door prize.  
	>> That's great.  Trying one more time.  We'll wrap up after the door prizes.  
	>> Madam Chair.  
	>> We still have a lot of tickets for CCLVI, a lot of tickets, $500, CCLVI members will sell you a bunch of them.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Sounds like a plan.  Thank you.  Door prizes.  Okay.  We're going to have three more door prizes here today.  I'm glad because -- I wanted to be sure to be able to give everyone someone and I'll give one brief comment.  I'm a user of Be My Eyes, and I love it.  I know that AIRA and AI are great, but it's great to have that contact with a person sometimes.  
	>> All right.  Our first door prize is given by the ACB Lions.  That is $50.  And the winner of that prize is Gale -- Gail Lincoln, and she is here in person.  Gail Lincoln.  Our next one is a $25 gift card, donated by Jeff Thom.  It's $25, Denny's gift card.  It's $25, Denny's gift card.  Donated by Jeff Thom, and it goes to Amy Mckough, and she is in person.  The $25 Denny's gift card.  Okay.  The final one is donated proudly by the Illinois Council of the Blind, $25, and the winner of that is Art Cabinilla.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Thank you for door prizes.  Appreciate it.  I wanted to remind people the polls will open at 2:00 p.m.  today Central Time, so make those calculations on your schedule, wherever you may be, and take the time to cast your individual votes.  This will be the last vote on the agenda.  So don't forget.  And would my other gifts to all of you now, some additional time to get to lunch or your tours.  Enjoy the candy store, those of you who are going, and thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to preside this morning and be back on stage and feel at home with ACB.  Thank you.  [Applause] 
	>> Are we in recess, Madam President?  
	>> Madam Chair?  Madam Chair?  Point of information.  
	>> KIM CHARLSON:  Go ahead.  
	>> I want to admit I was late coming in here this morning, shame on me, but were the resolutions read and the amendments read?  
	>> No, they were not.  Unless it was before my time.  They're supposed to be read today before we go to vote.  
	>> I'm going to turn the mic over to Deb and she's going to resolve that, because I think they are recorded.  
	>> Thank you.  
	>> This is absolutely my bad.  It's the first mistake of the hour.  I've made several others today.  Rick, do we have the -- the resolutions, the individual resolutions?  And the constitution and bylaws amendments?  
	>> It will take me about three minutes to rack it.  
	>> DEB COOK LEWIS:  Hold on, my apologies, but we will give you a reading.  They were mailed out as well, which is probably the more useful thing for most of us, but certainly, we did agree to read them and I missed sticking them back on the agenda.  So it's my fault.  So they will be on ACB Media as well, but we promised to read them and Rick will get them in just a moment.  There are three resolutions and two bylaw amendments.  And if you would like to hear them, just hold still, because we're not late.  I'm just being honest about what I forgot to do.  
	>> Madam President.  
	>> Good.  
	>> I do think we need to note that sometimes people here at convention have an issue with their email.  
	>> DEB COOK LEWIS:  We're going to read them, Carla.  
	>> CARLA RUSCHIVAL:  I want to remind there are people at home who don't have email.  
	>> They've been on ACB Media about a day and a half.  We have them available but we agreed to do this.  
	>> They're also on the ACB business podcast, and they were sent out yesterday to the distribution list electronically.  
	>> Yes, so the one thing we've missed is reading them here.  Let me know when you're ready for them to read.  
	>> What I do every night, I adjust the agenda for what I think is really going to happen in the day, based on what happened in the day before, and I've always caught those, but I missed them.  Funny.  This was the one time it was actually built into the system.  It's my fault.  Other times we were going to read them, I had to write them in, but it should have been in there.  It's okay.  Great.  
	>> We will get there.  Act upon complaints of prohibited conduct and be it further resolved that a copy of this resolution shall be sent to each affiliate along with a link to ACB's prohibited conduct policy and information on how to request assistance, if desired, to develop such a poll.  End of resolution 2023-06.  
[Reading in Spanish] 
Resolution, 2023-06, encouraging affiliates to present -- 
	>> ACB, has adopted a policy on prohibited conduct and applicable complaint procedures, 
and whereas, the general purpose of this document is to maintain the integrity of its events and online performance by presenting a welcoming, safe, respectful environment for all who participate, 
and whereas, such a prohibited conduct policy is intended to ensure that event participants have a procedure under which to direct complaints about conduct that may arise to a serious violation of law or may be less serious in nature or in contrast to the event of the organization, and some have chosen to present their own, 
and, whereas, the appropriate content for an affiliate's conduct policy will certainly different based upon circumstances that may be unique to that affiliate, 
and, whereas, a prohibit conduct policy may help to alleviate legal action, now, there it implementing procedures in order to enable facilities to act upon complaints of prohibited conduct and a copy of this resolution shall be sent to each affiliate along to the ACB prohibit conduct policy, information on how to request information, if desired. 
End of 2023-06.  
[Reading in Spanish] 
Resolution 2023-12 Funding of Visual Interpreting Services Submitted by the California Council of the Blind and Robert Acosta.  
Whereas, access to information, in all its forms, is very possibly the largest impediment to the independence of people who are blind or have low vision; 
and Whereas, technological advancements have brought about new visual interpretation services, such as AIRA, that provide professional and confidential services for a fee; 
and Whereas, such visual interpretation services are designed to provide a variety of assistance to customers with vision impairments, including, but not limited to, reading mail and other materials, helping to administer and read the results of at-home medical tests, reading computer screens, and providing environmental information that enables individuals to travel safely; 
and Whereas, the cost of such visual interpreting services is generally unaffordable for low- and middle-income individuals with vision loss. 
Now, therefore, be it resolved by the American Council of the Blind in convention assembled that this organization encourage its affiliates to advocate for funding of professional visual interpretation services at the state level for people who are blind or who have low vision.  
End of Resolution 2023-12.  
[Reading in Spanish] 
Resolution 2023-13 Ride-sharing and communication.  Submitted by:  Guillermo Robles, Steve Bauer and the California Council of the Blind.  
Whereas, on-demand transportation services such as Lyft and Uber have had an extremely positive impact on the independence of people who are blind or have low vision across the country; 
and, Whereas, the use of these services requires effective, direct, and clear communication between driver and passenger; 
and Whereas, a passenger who is blind or has low vision is negatively impacted by language barriers and absence of verbal communication; 
and Whereas, the lack of effective, direct, and clear communication has resulted in the following:  Unmet requests for a driver to communicate verbally to the passenger of their presence and to identify their location; Failure of a driver to follow passenger instructions; Passengers being dropped off in incorrect and often unsafe locations.  
Now, therefore be it resolved by the American Council of the Blind in convention assembled that this organization initiate discussion with said service providers to seek changes in the service platform in order to allow passengers who are blind or have low vision to communicate their preferred language and to ensure that drivers who may take their ride requests are limited to those who speak the preferred language of the passenger who is blind or has low vision.  
End of Resolution 2023-13.  	
[Reading in Spanish] 
	>> Madam President, would you like to continue with the constitution and bylaws?  
	>> Please.  
	>> The Constitution and Bylaws Committee is pleased to present the following for the membership and the committee recommends a do pass.  
2023-01.  Proposed amendment to Bylaw 5A to make the ACB treasurer a mandatory member of the budget committee Bylaw 5:  Powers and Duties of the Board of Directors. 
Current language:  A.  The Board of Directors shall elect a subcommittee of three (3) which shall review and make recommendations to the board regarding the annual budget submitted by the executive director.  Once a budget has been adopted by the Board of Directors, it cannot be altered except by a two-thirds (2/3) vote of the Board of Directors.  
Proposed amendment language:  A.  The Board of Directors shall elect three (3) members to serve with the treasurer on a committee which shall review and make recommendations to the board regarding the annual budget submitted by the executive director.  Once a budget has been adopted, it cannot be altered except by a two-thirds (2/3) vote of the Board.  
End of bylaw amendment 2023-01.  
2023-02.  Proposed amendment to Bylaw 6D to set the time for the appointment of the Constitution and Bylaws Committee to coincide with that specified for the resolutions committee; setting a new deadline of sixty (60) days before the opening of the convention for submission of constitution and/or bylaws amendments to the committee; and striking the sentence referencing submission of amendments in ASCII format Bylaw 6:  Committees.  
Current language:  D.  Constitution and Bylaws Committee:  At least ninety (90) days prior to the opening of each annual conference and convention, the President shall appoint a chairperson and at least four (4) additional members to a Constitution and Bylaws Committee.  This committee shall have the responsibility of considering and preparing amendments to the constitution and bylaws for presentation to the conference and convention.  All proposed amendments to the constitution and/or bylaws must be submitted in writing to the Constitution and Bylaws Committee on or before the end of the first day following the day of the roll call meeting of the conference and convention.  Amendments, whenever possible, shall be submitted electronically in ASCII text format.  The Constitution and Bylaws Committee must report all such written submissions, with or without committee recommendation.  
Proposed amendment language:  D.  Constitution and Bylaws Committee:  The president, within sixty (60) days after the close of each national conference and convention, shall appoint a chairperson and not less than four (4) additional members to a Constitution and Bylaws Committee.  This committee shall have the responsibility of considering and preparing amendments to the constitution and bylaws for presentation to the conference and convention.  Any amendments to be considered shall be submitted to the committee not less than sixty (60) days prior to the opening date of each conference and convention.  The Constitution and Bylaws Committee shall report all proposed constitution and/or bylaw amendments to the conference and convention with or without committee recommendation.  
End of bylaw amendment 2023-02.  This concludes the ACB constitution and bylaws amendments for consideration on June 23, 2023.  
[Reading in Spanish] 
Resolution 2023-06 -- 
	>> That was a teaser.  
	>> That was going to be a killer.  All righty.  We have done what we said we would do, which is to re-read the resolution and bylaw amendments.  Thank you very much for getting those together for me.  Yes, excellent.  I believe we have now covered all of our obligations and ideas and announcements, so before I hear any more, I'm going to call us in recess until tomorrow morning, and don't forget to vote.  Thank you.  [Applause] 
[ Human realtime captioning by HRI CART. ]