NEW YORK (AP) - Technology and training have improved to the point that
blind people can adeptly perform a dazzling array of jobs -- soon to include the
governorship of New York. The biggest obstacle still in their way, advocates
say, is the negative attitude of many employers.
The most recent available statistics suggest that only about 30 percent of
working-age blind people have jobs. That figure was calculated more than 10
years ago, but the major groups lobbying on behalf of blind Americans believe it
remains accurate despite numerous technological advances.
"Most people don't know a blind person, so they assume that blind people are
not capable of doing most jobs when in fact that's not true," said Chris
Danielsen, spokesman for the National Federation of the Blind.
Exhibit A, for the moment, is David Paterson, the legally blind lieutenant
governor of New York from Harlem who will be sworn in Monday as governor,
replacing scandal-tarnished Eliot Spitzer.
However, blind people hold all sorts of jobs these days -- judge, fitness
trainer, TV show host, registered nurse, lawyer and so on.
"Unfortunately we're still living in an age of misperceptions of what blind
people can do," said Carl Augusto, president of the American Foundation for the
Blind. "We're hoping that an employer considering hiring a blind person will say
that if David Paterson can be governor and be legally blind, maybe this
applicant who is blind can be a good computer programmer."
There are an estimated 10 million visually impaired people in the United
States, including about 1.3 million who are legally blind, according to
Augusto's foundation. The foundation says legal blindness is generally described
as visual acuity of 20-200 or less in the better eye, with a corrective lens.
Paterson has enough sight in his right eye to walk unaided, recognize people at
conversational distance and read if the text is close to his face.
In theory, those people are covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act,
which among its many provisions requires employers to give fair consideration
and treatment to visually impaired employees and job applicants. But Augusto
said employers routinely turn down blind applicants without incurring legal
sanction.
"The ADA is a wonderful law, but many employers find a way not to seriously
consider blind people," he said. "They look at themselves and then say, 'I can't
imagine how a blind person can be a computer programmer. They can't possibly do
it.'"
Advocacy groups work persistently to change such attitudes, with employer
education programs and public appearances by successful blind people to discuss
their capabilities. One component of such campaigns is to raise awareness of the
ever-evolving technology that helps blind people handle more types of jobs --
including software that reads aloud information on a computer screen and
scanners that can covert printed material into Braille or an accessible
electronic format.
"The assisted technology has made the playing field as level as it's ever
been for blind people," said Kirk Adams, president of Seattle's Lighthouse for
the Blind, a nonprofit agency that provides job help. "There are fewer and fewer
jobs a blind person can't do."
Adams, 46, said being blind seemed a hindrance when he first began
post-college job hunting, but he was hired as a securities broker and later
served in various nonprofit fundraising jobs before moving to Lighthouse, which
has 190 blind people on its payroll.
One problem he notes is the difficulty many young blind people face in
getting short-term or part-time work during high school and college.
"There's a real divergence with sighted kids," Adams said. "It's very
typical that a blind kid at 16 or 18 is not having success finding that first
employment -- we see a lot of frustration around that age because employers may
not be thinking about making those short-term jobs accessible."
The American Foundation for the Blind says it latest research indicates that
once young blind people complete top-notch training and education programs, they
attain an employment rate not much lower than sighted people. But Augusto said
the overall portion of blind people with jobs remains low because many older
workers who lose vision in middle age drop out of the work force rather than
undergo retraining.
"You get a bunch of people in their 50s who all of sudden are visually
impaired -- they can't drive anymore, they'll get Social Security benefits and
maybe disability insurance," Augusto said. "They say, 'The heck with it, we're
not going back to work. We don't want to go through the rehabilitation training
-- it's too hard.'"
Kevan Worley, a blind Coloradan, runs a company that provides thousands of
meals a day to Army troops at Fort Carson in Colorado Springs. About 70 percent
of his 200 employees are blind or otherwise disabled.
"There are still stereotypes of blind people," he said. "When employers,
educators, even parents of blind kids have those stereotypes and low
expectations, many are being kept down and out."
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which tracks workplace
discrimination cases covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act, says 455
such complaints were filed last year by visually impaired workers -- the highest
number since 1995.
"If someone's blind, there's a huge stigma to overcome and all kinds of
myths and fears in the employer community," EEOC spokesman David Grinberg said.
"The fact is that in the 21st century workplace people who are blind are
just as able to do a job as anyone else -- they just need to be given a chance,"
he said. "They know the deck is stacked against them. They work harder than
others, and they end out being more effective workers."
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