By Jennifer Dunnam

Here we are, in a brand new year with much work ahead and many exciting opportunities to build on the work we did in 2012, to make the coming year even better.

Our annual convention last October in Duluth was one of the best we have had.  Many people worked hard to make it so.  You will read about the convention in detail in the next issue.  The core group of Federationists from Duluth continues to meet and work on ways to spread our positive message and provide practical help to blind people in the northeast region of the state.

We continue to work toward the elimination of the payment of subminimum wages to people with disabilities.  Three of the 80-plus co-sponsors on the 2012 House bill dealing with this issue were from Minnesota, and we will work to make sure they stand with us again in the 113^th Congress along with more of their colleagues. 

We participated in protests on two different issues during the second half of 2012.  The first was in August, to make the public aware that Goodwill Industries is one of the entities that pays some of its workers below the minimum wage.  The Federation protested at 90 sites around the country, and two of them were in Minnesota — one in Cloquet and the other in St. Paul.  The day before the protests, I received a call from an official in the state Goodwill organization.  They knew of our protests and wanted to be sure that we were aware that in Minnesota the Goodwill sites pay their workers minimum wage.  I told him I was glad to hear that and asked if Goodwill in Minnesota would be willing to stand up and join with us in working to get the policy changed throughout the rest of the country.  He said, in effect, that they believe there are people for whom a subminimum wage job is the right situation and that other states should decide what was right for them.  Therefore, although the conversation remained cordial, I let him know that The National Federation of the Blind would still be out on the picket lines in Minnesota the next day, which we were.  We carried signs, distributed fliers, chanted and sang, and talked with many people who were outraged and wanted to do what they could to help eliminate the discriminatory practice. 

Earlier this summer, an article appeared in the Pioneer Press based on interviews with managers in facilities that paid subminimum wages to workers with disabilities and which extolled the virtues of any paycheck, no matter how small.  At the time, we got a letter to the editor published in follow-up, providing the public with a fuller picture of the issue.  We maintained contact with the reporter who wrote that article, and when our protest was held, he wrote another article about it, helping to further correct some of the information from his previous article.  There was also a piece in a journal in Cloquet, and we were interviewed on the Radio Talking Book as well.

Recently an editorial appeared in the New York Times making a strong argument for raising the federal minimum wage for everyone (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/05/opinion/meanwhile-at-the-bottom-of-the-wage-scale.html).  The points made in this article apply just as well in the reasoning for eliminating subminimum wages.  With a discussion such as this in the public eye, the time is right to get this taken care of finally.

The problem of subminimum wages is one on which we have worked for decades.  Some other issues that we tackle could likely not have been imagined decades ago.  In December, several Minnesota Federationists joined more than a hundred others from around the country in Seattle to participate in a demonstration in front of the Amazon.com headquarters.  Amazon has been increasing its marketing of its Kindle eBook reader content to schools, despite the fact that material in Kindle format is not fully accessible to blind people and would therefore leave out blind students behind in the classroom.  It is high time that Amazon joined other eBook producers in making their content available to read, search, navigate, and otherwise interact with by using speech output and/or braille.  We will not give up until they do so.

We will soon begin to work on another Walk For Opportunity for this fall.  This event has been held in Minnesota for more than 30 years, at different locations throughout the years.  At our 2011 annual convention, we set up a task force to figure out how to bring in funds and increase participation.  The task force recommended holding the walk in Rochester in 2012.  We did so, and it was a very successful event by all accounts.  We took in more than $5,000 — well above our earnings in 2011 and some previous years.  The Rochester chapter did a fantastic job of planning, hosting, and getting the word out about the NFB to the people of Rochester.  For many, it was their first time participating.  At least 20% of the funds were raised by people going out and knocking on doors; commendations to the "knock squad.”

We work in many ways to help improve life for blind people.  We advocate for individuals when the need arises, and this work, of course, helps not only the individual in question but also those who come after.  Some of our members are adult English language learners.  Recently, a few of them brought to our attention that at one of the schools they were attending, there began to be a problem.  Instead of the teachers interacting directly with the blind students in the way they do with the sighted students, the teachers had begun mostly deferring to one specific teacher who made decisions on their behalf without their input.  These students were not asking for special favors — they just wanted to be treated equitably with the other students in the school.  We communicated with the school's director about this situation, and we now understand that things have improved markedly.

Each year, Federationists participate in a Day at the Capitol and work with legislators to educate them about the real issues of blindness and what we need, and do not need, in the legislative arena.  We are most effective when our members maintain relationships with their specific legislators — going to meetings in the local area, getting on their mailing lists, and calling and emailing them when we have specific issues related to blindness.  We get things done because of the help of all our members.

The Minnesota Bulletin that you are reading right now is yet another place in which we can use much more help.  Please consider writing an article; there is no doubt that you have a story that could help someone else or a perspective on an issue that can bring more clarity.

I look forward to working with everyone this year in big and small ways to bring down barriers of all sorts and replace them with high expectations and real progress.  Happy 2013!