[Jobs] industries for the blind

Wed Aug 15 13:39:09 CDT 2007

Freedom Scientific.
Mike 

Michael Bullis, NOMC
Blind Industries and Services of Maryland
410-737-2604
email mbullis at bism.org

-----Original Message-----
From: jobs-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:jobs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
Of Dick Davis
Sent: Wednesday, August 15, 2007 2:32 PM
To: 'Jobs for the Blind'
Subject: Re: [Jobs] industries for the blind

I'm sure I must know what FS is, but it doesn't come to mind.  What is
it?
Dick Davis

-----Original Message-----
From: jobs-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:jobs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
Of Bryan Schulz
Sent: Wednesday, August 15, 2007 10:36 AM
To: Jobs for the Blind
Subject: Re: [Jobs] industries for the blind

hi,

That's going to be a neat trick, i was told he took a job at FS.
Bryan

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dick Davis" <ddavis at blindinc.org>
To: "'Jobs for the Blind'" <jobs at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 14, 2007 12:57 PM
Subject: Re: [Jobs] industries for the blind

> Everett,
> Based on my reading of it, the person to implement it is Jim McCarthy.
I
> imagine it should be one of our priorities at the Washington Seminar.
> Dick Davis
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: jobs-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:jobs-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf 
> Of
> Everett Gavel
> Sent: Monday, August 13, 2007 6:39 PM
> To: Jobs for the Blind
> Subject: Re: [Jobs] industries for the blind
>
> Ah, thanks for this.  Very nice.  Timely, indeed.  So
> who is working on this particular resolution/effort?
> Can specific names be named, as to who to contact to
> see how to possibly help?  Or to give encouragement,
> perhaps?  ;-)
>
> Thanks, Michael, for posting this.
>
> Regards,
> Everett
> www.everettgavel.com
>
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
>> I think the best and most recent exposition of NFB's
> position re jwod is
>> resolution 2006-06.  NIB hated it.
>>
>> RESOLUTION 2006-06
>> Regarding Reform of the Javits-Wagner-O'Day Act
>>
>> WHEREAS, the program now known as the
> Javits-Wagner-O'Day (JWOD) Program
>> was established during the Depression to create jobs
> for blind people by
>> allowing
>> nonprofit agencies employing the blind to have
> priority in sales of
>> products to the federal government as long as 75
> percent of the labor
>> hours worked
>> directly on production of products at the agency were
> performed by blind
>> persons; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, JWOD was amended in 1971 to add those with
> other severe
>> disabilities to the pool of workers and to add
> services in addition to
>> products bought
>> by the federal government as items eligible for
> priority, essentially
>> the sole amendment in this nearly seventy-year-old
> law; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, the priority and placement of contracts are
> administered by two
>> central nonprofits, National Industries for the Blind
> (NIB) and NISH
>> (formerly
>> known as National Industries for the Severely
> Handicapped), mirroring
>> the two separate systems of sheltered workshops
> employing the disabled,
>> one for the
>> blind and the other for those with other severe
> disabilities; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, the two central nonprofits routinely decline
> to provide
>> information about their programs and the agencies to
> which they allocate
>> federal contracts
>> on the ground that the central nonprofits are not
> arms of the federal
>> government but are autonomous, making assessment of
> the program and
>> accountability
>> for the billions being spent almost impossible to
> perform; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, the JWOD Program did for a time provide
> somewhat better
>> employment opportunities to blind and otherwise
> severely disabled
>> workers, but the law
>> and practices under JWOD have not been fundamentally
> changed in nearly
>> seventy years and have become outdated, not
> reflecting the growing
>> complexity of
>> federal procurement or vastly changed national
> policies on disability
>> programming, which makes JWOD essentially a program
> from another era
>> that urgently
>> needs overhaul and oversight to eliminate abuses of
> the system; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, some of these abuses include:
>>
>> (1) to meet the 75 percent-hours-of-direct labor
> requirement, jobs may
>> be split into three or four smaller jobs, generating
> more hours spent by
>> blind or
>> disabled workers, whose productivity is thus
> artificially capped;
>>
>> (2) the resulting jobs are often paid as piece rate
> with the rates set
>> so high that minimum wage can rarely be achieved;
>>
>> (3) blind and disabled workers are kept on the shop
> floor and rarely
>> advanced into management because they are more
> valuable in direct-labor
>> jobs to qualify
>> for the priority than they are as managers;
>>
>> (4) the resulting jobs come and go, making employment
> of blind and
>> disabled workers intermittent and present only to
> qualify for the
>> federal priority; and
>>
>>
>> (5) the definition of people with other severe
> disabilities has been
>> interpreted to be ridiculously elastic to qualify for
> the priority; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, these practices have long been hidden behind
> a blizzard of
>> paperwork through which it is almost impossible to
> learn the fundamental
>> facts while
>> program proponents routinely proclaim that they and
> their programs are
>> dedicated to helping the disabled, all of which
> practices mean good jobs
>> for some,
>> but not for the blind and disabled workers; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, the United States Senate's Committee on
> Health, Education,
>> Labor and Pensions (HELP Committee) has recently
> uncovered a whole
>> second set of program
>> abuses the Committee describes as "numerous examples
> of excessive
>> executive compensation, lavish perquisites, conflicts
> of interest, and
>> self-dealing"
>> while media reports have fleshed out these findings
> as shockingly high
>> salaries, manipulation of corporate shells for the
> personal benefit of
>> able-bodied
>> managers, and other financial shenanigans with the
> money intended to
>> benefit disabled workers; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, JWOD is now a program seriously out of
> control, blending
>> antiquated language with no accountability, resulting
> in a situation in
>> which $2 billion
>> in sales to the federal government yields annual
> average wages to the
>> blind and disabled employees of $8,000, a scandal
> recently exposed by
>> the Senate
>> HELP Committee, which demonstrates that the current
> JWOD Program is both
>> financially and morally bankrupt, allowing some of
> its managers to grab
>> millions
>> of dollars while they pretend to care about the
> disabled and receive the
>> plaudits of their communities for being so
> big-hearted; and
>>
>> WHEREAS, it is time to end these abuses of worker
> opportunities and
>> abuse of the American people's trust by amending JWOD
> in the following
>> ways:
>>
>> (1) remove the requirement that entities eligible for
> the priority in
>> sales to the federal government be nonprofits,
> allowing both nonprofit
>> and for-profit
>> companies to establish eligibility;
>>
>> (2) require that all entities seeking the priority
> agree specifically to
>> the jurisdiction of the National Labor Relations Act
> and the Fair Labor
>> Standards
>> Act, both of which have been disputed in the past;
>>
>> (3) replace the 75 percent-direct-labor requirement
> with a requirement
>> that the entity qualify for priority sales only if at
> least 51 percent
>> of all compensation
>> and benefits throughout the entire entity is paid to
> blind or disabled
>> workers, if at least 51 percent of all full-and
> part-time jobs are held
>> by blind
>> or disabled workers, and if blind and disabled
> workers receive actual
>> preference for promotion within the entity as a
> stated and implemented
>> policy;
>>
>> (4) provide that the entire entity must meet the
> 51-percent rules,
>> including all divisions, wholly-owned subsidiaries,
> and any other
>> corporate shell created
>> to avoid application of the 51-percent rules;
>>
>> (5) prohibit buying products and services from
> nonqualified companies
>> and then selling exactly those same products or
> services which have not
>> been made
>> or packaged by blind or disabled workers to the
> federal government along
>> with prohibiting qualifying entities from dealing
> with other companies
>> owned by
>> officers, directors, top managers, or families of
> these individuals;
>>
>> (6) eliminate the temptation to be creative with the
> definition of
>> "blindness" or "other disability," by defining as
> blind or disabled
>> solely those individuals
>> who are currently receiving or are currently eligible
> (except for
>> resource tests) to receive Supplemental Security
> Income (SSI) or Social
>> Security Disability
>> Insurance (SSDI) as a blind or otherwise disabled
> individual, placing
>> the determination of disability outside JWOD and
> within a system that
>> routinely makes
>> such determinations for other unrelated and
> compelling interests, the
>> Social Security Administration;
>>
>> (7) eliminate the central nonprofits (NIB and NISH)
> from JWOD and
>> replace them with administration of the JWOD Program
> by the Employment
>> and Training Administration
>> or another appropriate unit within the United States
> Department of
>> Labor, achieving coordination with other employment
> programs and also
>> vital public accountability;
>>
>> (8) reconstitute the Committee for Purchase from
> People Who Are Blind or
>> Severely Disabled, a small federal agency with
> current JWOD oversight
>> and administrative
>> responsibilities, as a program oversight and policy
> committee having a
>> majority of public members, a majority of whom are
> blind or otherwise
>> severely disabled;
>> and
>>
>> WHEREAS, these sweeping proposals are needed to end
> the abuses of JWOD
>> that have arisen within the program, including those
> abuses recently
>> brought to light
>> by the HELP Committee, and also to synchronize the
> original intent of
>> JWOD with its daily effect on the lives of blind and
> disabled people:
>> Now, therefore,
>>
>>
>> BE IT RESOLVED by the National Federation of the
> Blind in Convention
>> assembled this seventh day of July, 2006, in the City
> of Dallas, Texas,
>> that this organization
>> energetically seek congressional amendment of the
> Javits-Wagner-O'Day
>> Act to restore the original intent and mission of the
> Act and to make
>> real the original
>> promise of good work, good-paying work, respectable
> work for blind and
>> disabled Americans by ending abuses that have arisen
> in this
>> seventy-year-old program,
>> which can once again be progressive.
>>
>>
>
>
>
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