1) What’s Happening in the Nation’s Capital?
News from the Transition Team: Apply for a Position in the Obama Administration and Bring Independent Living to the Capitol!
Senate Could Give New President Early Legislative Victories
2) National News
RSA Responds to NCIL Demands Made During 2008 Annual Conference
Obama Makes One Apparently Disability-Friendly Appointment; Considers Another
3) State News
Woman with Developmental Disability Starved to Death in New Jersey Group Home; Probe Launched
Nebraska Gov. Says State Workers Shouldn’t Help Disabled Buy Porn
4) Announcements
David Capozzi Named Executive Director of the Access Board
New Blog Aimed at Voters with Disabilities Launched by the CIL of South Florida
News from the Transition Team: Apply for a Position in the Obama Administration and Bring Independent Living to the Capitol!
At its recent meeting, the NCIL Board of Directors developed a list of IL and disability advocates to recommend to President-Elect Barak Obama's Transition Team. If you are interested in applying for positions in the new Administration, NCIL encourages you to visit www.change.gov and complete a job application. The Transition Team's "Agency reviewers" will review these (eventually).
It is important to note that the Transition Team is just getting organized. Eventually there will be 400 people in the DC office. Many folks are back in Chicago and / or across the country waiting for their start dates with the Transition Team.
Although it's obviously always good to give your resume to people you know who are close to the Transition Team or people involved in the campaign, it is important to note that right now nothing is set in stone. The next year and a half will be fluid. The President, once inaugurated on January 20th, must first nominate his Cabinet level Secretaries, whom the Senate must confirm. The same goes for their Assistant Secretaries and others, before agencies like RSA and the Office of Disability Employment Policy can be organized. Contrary to all the hype, no one has anything sewn up and anything can change depending on a Department Secretary and his or her Administrator’s staff picks.
Yes, President-Elect Obama's Transition Team is carefully reviewing resumes and will consider organizations' recommendations, but no one will be hired officially for a job in a specific Federal agency this month or next. If you hear otherwise, please notify deb@ncil.org. Aside from Cabinet assignments (e.g., Senator Clinton as Secretary of State), no one has a key to an office yet and everything is subject to change based on any number of reasons.
On the Conference calls the progressive and disability communities have had with key Transition Team staff, we were told not to worry; even if you didn't support the Campaign they will consider you. Transition Team staff joked that they are still learning where the bathrooms are and just got a computer... everything is in flux. Again, the Transition Team staff has asked us kindly to encourage people to complete the online application, to send our recommendations and resumes, and to please, please, be patient.
To apply go to: www.change.gov. At the top of the screen click on Jobs, then select Apply Now from the dropdown. Here you will find instructions on how to apply for jobs in the Administration and a form to indicate your initial interest. Within a few days, you will receive an email with a link to a more complete on-line application.
In addition to your resume, you will need to know which job(s) you are interested in. To look at all the jobs available in the new administration, you need to go to the Plum Book website and look through the positions.
Senate Could Give New President Early Legislative Victories
Source: Washington Post, by Paul Kane (excerpted)
As Senate Democrats prepare for next year's agenda, they are likely to have a working filibuster-proof majority on a variety of legislative issues that could provide early victories for President-elect Barack Obama. Though they are two votes short of their quest for 60 votes -- with two races still undecided -- Democrats say that regular support from a few Republican moderates will allow them to pass bills that were halted in the current Congress by GOP parliamentary roadblocks. "The truth is . . . we will be fine on most major issues. We will almost always have some moderate Republican support," said Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN). Here are some of the bills that stalled in the current Congress but may pass next year.
Health care: Democrats have pressed to give the Department of Health and Human Services authority to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies for lower prescription drug prices for seniors who participate in the Medicare Part D program, which passed Congress in late 2003. Shortly after taking power in 2007, House Democrats approved legislation approving such authority, over the objections of pharmaceutical companies and their lobbying group, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. But the plan failed in the Senate, receiving 55 votes in April 2007.
Stimulus: Obama is proposing a stimulus package that could include $500 billion in new spending and $200 billion in middle-class tax cuts, but Democrats cannot be certain that they have the votes to pass such a major proposal. House Republican leaders have disparaged the costly proposals, meaning Democrats may have to find 60 votes to overcome a GOP filibuster. In September, Republicans blocked that $61 billion package. Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-NV) mustered 52 votes for that plan, but three Democratic senators were missing. With the seven new Senate Democrats, Reid should be able to push through the smaller plan easily.
Civil rights: After the failure of sweeping immigration overhaul, Democrats scaled back their effort to focus on the DREAM Act. The legislation would have halted deportation efforts of children who are here illegally, giving them citizenship opportunities if they entered the country before age 16 and have lived here for five years.
In April, 50 Democrats and six Republicans supported legislation that would have amended the 1964 Civil Rights Act by allowing more time for workers to file discrimination complaints. Five new Democrats will be replacing Republicans who opposed the legislation named after Lilly Ledbetter, the female employee who lost her suit against Goodyear Tire and Rubber over discrimination claims. The Supreme Court ruled that Ledbetter should have filed her claim within six months of the alleged incidents.
Foreign policy: Democrats expect to take their lead on Iraq from Obama, who has called for a near-total troop withdrawal within 16 months. In the meantime, Sen. James Webb (D-VA) may reintroduce his bill requiring that soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan remain stateside for the same amount of time they had spent in battle. Of all the antiwar measures considered in the 110th Congress, Webb's was the closest to passing. Read More.
RSA Responds to NCIL Demands Made During 2008 Annual Conference
As advocates recall, on Wednesday, July 22nd, over 200 NCIL advocates protested outside the U.S. Rehabilitation Services Administration offices. The boisterous group chanted until Tracy Justesen, Assistant Secretary for Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, came down and agreed to meet with a delegation of NCIL representatives. The delegation presented the membership’s demands.
1. Cease the narrow and inconsistent interpretations of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as Amended.
2. Ensure that DSU’s are properly interpreting regulations and partnering with SILCs.
3. Adopt the existing SILC Standards and Indicators to ensure of consistent interpretation and implementation.
4. Issue a consistent set of guidelines under which the SPIL/SILC review will be conducted that is based on the SILC approved Standards and Indicators. Such guidelines shall be given to the site 30 days prior to the review.
5. Contract with NCIL, CILs, and SILCs to conduct in-depth training for RSA staff to interpret and understand IL regulations.
6. Actively recruit people with disabilities in positions at RSA who demonstrate an understanding and commitment to the independent living philosophy to address the attrition of RSA staff who understand and promote consumer control.
7. Publish actual comments regarding policy and programmatic changes.
8. Collaborate with NCIL to press for the reauthorization of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as Amended.
9. Collaborate with NCIL to help garner increased Federal funding for the IL Program.
10. Coordinate with NCIL’s efforts to develop and implement standardized outcome measures for SILCs and CILs.
11. Coordinate with NCIL to better market the IL Program.
RSA has finally responded in writing to NCIL’s demands, but we remain concerned that these restrictions will continue to impede policy related to Independent Living and people with disabilities. Last month, NCIL President Kelly Buckland, NCIL Rehab Act Subcommittee Chair Jeff Hughes, and NCIL staff received hard copies of a letter responding to NCIL’s Demands. Today, NCIL received electronic copies of RSA’s letter, along with protocols and a monitoring guide attached.
Obama Makes One Apparently Disability-Friendly Appointment; Considers Another
Source: New York Times
As he prepares to take office, President-elect Barack Obama is relying on a small team of advisers who will lead his transition operation and help choose the members of his administration. Following is part of a series of profiles of potential members of the administration.
Lisa Brown has been chosen to be the White House staff secretary in the Obama administration, an office that experts describe as the nerve center of the White House. She will be the gatekeeper for nearly every piece of paper that reaches the president’s desk.
Former colleagues give Ms. Brown high marks for her organizational skills as well as her instincts for spotting problems. This is not her first stint in government, having served in the Clinton administration. Her ties to the Obama camp run through members of former Vice President Al Gore’s staff, with whom she has worked, as well as John D. Podesta, who has been directing Mr. Obama’s transition effort. She is inheriting a job that Mr. Podesta held in the Clinton administration. Ms. Brown is now working as part of an agency review team in the Obama transition office.
Ms. Brown used to be the executive director of the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy, a left-leaning legal organization in Washington. From 1997 to 2001, she served as in-house counsel to Mr. Gore and was a member of the Executive Board of the President’s Committee for Employment of People with Disabilities. She advised Mr. Gore on legal matters and on legislative and domestic policy initiatives. Before that she was a partner at the Washington law firm of Shea & Gardner. She was also active in pro bono work, focusing on cases that involved disabled people. The work she pursued for years on civil rights and disability issues will largely have to be set aside for the administrative tasks of sorting out the endless flow of memorandums, briefing books and speeches going into and out of the Oval Office.
Tammy Duckworth is being considered for the Secretary of veterans affairs (if she is not tapped by the governor of Illinois to replace Mr. Obama in the Senate seat he gave up).
She would bring to the job an intensely personal experience as a disabled veteran of the Iraq war, where she lost her legs when the helicopter she was flying was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade on Nov. 12, 2004. She became an advocate for veterans while still a patient at Walter Reed Medical Center, and she began speaking out — before Congress and later in an unsuccessful bid for Henry J. Hyde’s former seat in the House — about unmet needs regarding health care, employment and housing. Still a major in the Illinois National Guard, she has credibility with other service members (especially other Iraq veterans), whom she often refers to as “my buddies.” She has dealt with the nitty-gritty of a veterans affairs office — albeit on a far smaller scale than the federal agency — as director of the Illinois Department of Veterans’ Affairs, which claims more than $70 million in new initiatives during her nearly two years in the post.
In her own words: “I had my legs blown off in Iraq, and because I had my legs blown off in Iraq, people are listening to me. I’m not going to get my legs back, and that’s fine, but if that gives me a platform to talk about the things that are important to me, like education and jobs, that’s great.” Despite using two artificial legs and, at times, a wheelchair, completing the Chicago marathon this fall on a hand-cranked bicycle (time: 2 hours, 26 minutes and 31 seconds). She is working on regaining her scuba certification. With a father of English descent (whose family has roots in this country since the American Revolution) and a mother who is ethnically Chinese, was born in Thailand and is an American citizen, Ms. Duckworth is fluent in Thai and Indonesian. She is returning to flying small aircraft (“I’m not going to let some dude in Iraq who got lucky with an RPG decide when I will stop flying”).
She carries some baggage. At 40, Ms. Duckworth has never held elective office. And though she has testified repeatedly before Congress, she is virtually untested in Washington. Some suggest that her blunt support for veterans would be met with a tough, complicated reality of financial limits and the bureaucratic morass in the capital. The Department of Veterans Affairs is also a vast enterprise with enormous problems that will test the leadership, organizational and management skills of whoever gets the appointment.
Woman with Developmental Disability Starved to Death in New Jersey Group Home; Probe Launched
Source: Huffington Post, by Geoff Mulvhill
Camden - Prosecutors and a state agency are investigating the death of a 28-year-old woman who had dwindled to 48 pounds in a New Jersey-licensed home for developmentally disabled adults, officials said Tuesday.
The Division of Developmental Disabilities caseworker responsible for keeping tabs on the woman has been suspended, the home's license has been revoked and state workers are checking on the well-being of all 1,255 residents of similar homes, the officials said. "This death is unacceptable on many levels, and we're doing all we can to scrutinize every aspect and prevent tragedies such as this from occurring again," said Jennifer Velez, the state Human Services commissioner. Three lawmakers have asked for a broader state probe. "There's something wrong in this one instance," said state Rep. Declan O'Scanlon. "There also could be a systemic problem."
Tara O'Leary was removed on Sept. 11 from a central New Jersey home where she lived along with two other developmentally disabled adults, said Tom Fitzsimmons, an aide to state Sen. Jennifer Beck. O'Leary's cousin Eileen Devlin said medical records showed the woman had weighed 95 pounds at a doctor's visit in September 2007 - thin but not alarming for a woman only 4 feet 10 inches tall.
When an aunt, Patricia O'Leary, saw Tara in August 2008, however, she was gaunt, with unwashed hair and shoes on the wrong feet. The aunt was alarmed enough that she asked to be made the legal guardian of Tara, who had no guardian after her father died in 2005. Once she was taken from the home, Tara O'Leary lived in an institution for a little over a week before she was taken to Hunterdon Medical Center suffering from dehydration, malnutrition and bedsores and septic shock, Devlin said. She weighed just 48 pounds at check-in.
Devlin said that with a feeding tube, her cousin's weight rose to more than 70 pounds by November, but her overall medical condition did not improve. She died Nov. 10, days after she, Patricia O'Leary and another cousin became her legal guardians and decided to take her off life support.
Both the other women living in the home also were removed. Pam Ronan, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Human Services, said both are healthy now, but O'Scanlon said at least one had lost a dangerous amount of weight and was hospitalized for a time. Ronan said the home's license has been revoked. DHS would not identify the caseworker or operator of the home, saying that they are the subject of an ongoing investigation.
Relatives said that after Tara O'Leary's father's died, they were able to visit her only sporadically. They said they were never allowed to see her in the home where she was living - or even to know exactly where it was. That may have been in violation of state policy. Ronan said the rules are clear. "The family should be allowed to visit at any time," she said. "It should be allowed to visit in the home where she's living." Ronan said the state is looking into whether the caseworker was making monthly visits to the home. Read More.
Nebraska Gov. Says State Workers Shouldn’t Help Disabled Buy Porn
Source: Wall Street Journal Law Blog, by Dionne Searcey
Fresh from fixing a law that briefly turned Nebraska into a national repository for unruly teenagers, Gov. David Heineman (pictured) has turned his focus from safe haven laws to the state’s role in obtaining pornography for some residents. Heineman is reviewing a state policy that requires state employees to help patients at state hospitals buy pornography. The policy was highlighted in an Omaha World-Herald story concerning an alleged sexual assault at the Beatrice State Developmental Center, which houses developmentally disabled residents.
According to the paper, the assault suspect, a developmentally disabled man, had obtained permission from employees to possess pornography and had even been driven by state workers to two sex shops to buy it. “I don’t like it at all,” Heineman told the newspaper in this follow-up story. Heineman has plans to discuss with the state Attorney General’s Office discontinuing any involvement from state workers. The governor said, however, he would not restrict residents or family members from buying such material.
Officials of the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services said that under its policies concerning “appropriate sexual expression,” a resident at the Beatrice center or other state facilities for the developmentally disabled can obtain pornography if it’s approved by a treatment team. One Nebraska advocate for the mentally disabled said the outing for the man, who has been accused of sexually harassing the same woman he allegedly assaulted, was “like pouring kerosene on a fire.” The Beatrice center has been under fire for months as authorities investigate numerous allegations of abuse and neglect. Regardless, the incident raises some thorny legal issues for those interested in disabled rights as well as civil rights.
David Capozzi Named Executive Director of the Access Board
David M. Capozzi was named the Access Board's new Executive Director at a recent meeting of the Board. Members of the Board approved the selection in a unanimous vote. Capozzi, Director of the Board's Office of Technical and Information Services for over 16 years, succeeds Lawrence W. Roffee who retired in August. Capozzi had served as Acting Executive Director in the interim.
“I am honored to be your Executive Director and will work hard to meet and exceed your expectations,” Capozzi said in remarks to the Board following its vote. “While we can be proud of all that the Board has accomplished over the years, there is much left to be done,” he continued. “I have a vision of a higher performing agency that will grow to meet the demands of our complex society, and I look forward to working with all of you to tackle some important issues in the coming years.”
Prior to joining the Board in 1992, Capozzi worked at the National Easter Seals Society as vice president of advocacy and director of Project ACTION. He also served as national advocacy director at the Paralyzed Veterans of America. Questions should be directed to: United States Access Board: info@access-board.gov.
New Blog Aimed at Voters with Disabilities Launched by the CIL of South Florida
Americans With Disabilities Vote: This Blog is a project of the Advocacy Program of the Center for Independent Living of South Florida (Miami-Dade). It is designed to address the rights of voters with disabilities, and to provide information and resources to enhance compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, HAVA, and other federal laws. Justin Dart, the "father" of the Americans with Disabilities Act, said: "Vote as if your life depends on it -- because it does."
This Blog has several purposes:
- To share information and resources with our audience, designed to educate voters and Supervisors of Election about the role title II of the ADA plays in elections;
- To identify problems experienced by voters with disabilities, and to propose solutions (send information to mdubin@pobox.com);
- To identify other groups and organizations addressing voter protection, and to create collaborations with them;
- To provide a place where voters with disabilities can communicate with one another about their concerns and experiences;
- To create a central repository of information concerning voters with disabilities.
We welcome your input,participation, and insights. Posted by Marc Dubin, Esq. |
December 1, 2008