Terry Pacheco
2307 Arcola Ave.
Silver Spring, MD 20902-2826
Phone: (301) 806-4948
Email: terrypach328@gmail.com
1. My name is Terry Pacheco, a proud member of ACB since 1972. I am fortunate to be a wife, mother, and eldest member of a closely knit family. I seek your vote for ACB’s 2nd Vice President because I strongly believe that we must value ALL of our members regardless of age, technological abilities, or blindness/low vision skills. Several of my affiliate memberships listed below by acronym due to editorial space.
- ACB Board of Directors;
- ACBES - Board of Directors
- ACBGE
- AAVL;
- ACBDA;
- BSCB – Founding member and held many positions;
- BITS;
- BRL – Life Member
- CCLVI – 2nd Vice President and e-communications co-chair;
- LUA – Life member;
- RSVA – Vendorscope editor 1998-2001.
- For the past five years I have produced and facilitated VISAbilities of ACB Media 1.
My work experience includes:
- Four years administrating major food stamp program city wide; left due to blatant discrimination;
- Nine plus years Internal Revenue Service – running area Taxpayer office and detailing out to collection and Field Audit offices;
- Thirteen years RS vendor in order to work “mother’s hours.” State BEP Committee; At least tripled sales in four of five facilities.
- Seven years ACB Membership and Affiliate Services and Development. This was when we had 72 affiliates including 16,000 members;
- Three years Telecom company heading up disability outreach and the early stages of the CVAA;
- Ten years as Alternate Format and Web Accessibility Specialist at the FCC.
2. Let me first say that in order for our organization to grow and unite we must Learn From Our Past, Live in the Present, and Prepare for the future. These three concepts must work in unison. This I have done and plan to continue doing whether reaching out to someone who is twenty-five or eighty-five. In my earliest days of ACB, in my early 20s, my mentors seemed “old” to me – people like Durward McDaniel, M.J. Schmitt, Floyd Qualls, Mary Ballard Stephens and more. When I think of it now, I realize I am older now than they were then. But I learned and developed my leadership skills and characteristics primarily from them. We may not have always agreed with one another, but we had mutual respect, which is most important.
I bring my vast experience to the table, look at all sides of an issue, and try to make the best possible decision for the betterment of ACB.
3. In this day, we have three important challenges.
- What will happen insofar as the government is concerned? Medicare, Medicaid, jobs lost, education and rehabilitation services, and many other topics.
- Our members need to take more of a leadership role in both blindness and cross disability organizations. This needs a team approach and not just left to our staff.
- We need to be careful not to foster a comfortable situation that inadvertently discourages independence.
- Our lack of transparency. “Nothing About us Without us” is a cry being raised within our ranks too often.
These are but a few of the challenges we are facing in preparing for the future of our organization. I hope you give me the opportunity to see us overcome these challenges.