Tri-County Association for the Blind

Agency Overview

History

The Tri County Association for the Blind opened in 1921 as a non-profit organization designed "to improve the quality of life for people who are blind and visually impaired by helping them achieve their full potential and maiximum independence." Nancy Pew is identified as one of the most pivitol people to have had an influence on the establishment of what was then named the Dauphin County Branch for the Blind. The first jobs offered at the agency for people with seeing disabilities included cleaning, weaving, and fabricating braided rugs. In 1943, the association changed it name to the Tri-County Association for the Blind, which included Cumberland and Perry Counties. In the following year, the association took over eye clinics which were run by Junior Red Cross. The agency became a member of the United Fund of Harrisburg, now known as the United Way, in 1955. In 1985, the location of the agency moved from 2nd and South Street to its current location today: 1800 North Second Street, Harrisburg, PA.

Mission

The mission statement for Tri County is written as, "The Tri-County Association for the Blind works to improve the quality of life for people who are visually impaired in the Tri-County region of Dauphin, Cumberland and Perry Counties. By helping each person achieve his or her full potential and maximum independence, our consumers flourish within and enrich our communities. In addition, the Association provides prevention of blindness services to the public."

Services Offered

Access Technology: any machine or program that helps those who are blind or visually impaired work easier with a computer. (i.e. speech synthesizers, brailling machines, and enlarging and brightening texts on a computer screen)

Production Facility: Tri-County pays people with seeing disabilities, who might find it problematic to find employment elsewhere, to perform various tasks, which include packaging, assembly operations, mail preparation, pen production, chair mat production, transcribing different documents into braille, etc.

Recording Studio: Audio tapes are recorded, and the blind are able to rent numerous books on tape for their pleasure. Similarly, the radio reading service broadcasts the news and other information that those who are blind may not have access to otherwise.

Necessities store: Contains many items that are meant to help facilitate life for the blind or visually impaired. There are also other social services offered, such as in home shopping and home maintenance.

Fundraiser: Tri-County sells candles for $10 each. The candles come in over fifty different scents, and all of the proceeds go towards different ways to help people with seeing disabilities.

Prevention of Blindness: Tri-County provides preschool vision screenings, and educates youth and their parents on maintaining healty eyes and ways to prevent eye injuries.

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Community Issues

-Clients and Members- The Tri-County Association for the Blind not only employees those with eye-sight and other disabilities, but they also service them. Not all that is done at the Association benefits the seeing impaired, although they do receive newsletters. The Association also manufacturers items for government agencies such as the mayor's office and prisons as well as packaging foods for airline companies. There are also members and workers at Tri-County with no disabilities at all.

Cultural Assumptions

Society as a whole seems to find it easy to judge people who have disabilities, even those who are afflicted with something as superficial as poor eyesight. Although it is genreally easier for someone who is blind to lead a relatively "normal" life as opposed to someone with a more debilitating disabilty, there is still ubiquitous evidence that people with blindness are still not treated as equals in many cases. The blind are not given jobs, which many are fully qualified for and when they are employed, they are often given positions for which they are, in fact, over-qualified.

People who are blind are confined to a world where they are forced to rely heavily upon all of their other senses. Much of society assumes that since people who are blind do not have their sight, that there are other relavent functions that are absent as well. Many people who are blind had their sight at one point and were able to lead the normative existence which society believes the blind lacks. The majority of people who are blind are completely self-sufficient, despite their condition. However, because blindess is considered to be a disabilty, they are at times treated as though their mental capacity is negatively affected as well.

How We Can Solve These Problems

Society can solve the problem of rashly judging people based upon their physical appearance by simply understanding that disabilities are not synonymous with being helpless. This assumption is the result of countless years of naivite and cannot easily be erradicated, regardless of its simplicity. People who do not have an understanding of the nature of blindness would benefit from merely speaking to someone who is blind or taking some sort of proactive measures to learn more about the condition. One will find that many of the cases of blindess are comprised of those who are legally blind, but still have some sight.

People who are blind can, for the most part, do the same jobs as those with sight can. The blind hold positions such as teachers, writers, and doctors(http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/04/02/seeing.no.limits.ap/index.html). It is the actual act of understanding that being disabled does not equal incapability that is difficult for some people to reach. Being immersed into a sub-culture of people with disabilities (regardless of how major or minor the disabilities may be) is an important step to understanding more about the nature of disability itself and the people who have disabilities.

-The Agency-

Problems the Agency Faces

Danette Blank, Executive Director at Tri-County, identifies the association's main problem as sources of funding for the agency. "We always need more money," she stated, "especially since the government on both the state and federal levels has cut our funding." The Tri-County Association for the Blind faces many expences, which it depends on government funding, or donations to help pay off. For example, rent of the building, operating/utility costs, and wages all need to be paid.

Potential Ways To Overcome the Problems

One ideal solution to overcome the problem of a lack of funding for Tri-County is to make citizens more aware of Tri-County's existence as an agency in an attempt to earn more donations, or to ask the most loyal donors for more money. Creating more fundraisers in an attempt to earn more sponsers is probably the most likely and efficient answer. Another solution would be an employee reduction, but this of course would be one of the last resorts because one of the biggest services Tri-County offers people with seeing impairments is employment.

Mosaic of Experiences

Samples from Pre-Service Reflections:

-Excerpt from Amanda's: I’m truly at a loss as to what to expect from my forthcoming service-learning experience at the Tri-County Association for the Blind. On one hand, this particular assignment appears as though it would perhaps be easier than the others. For the most part, the average person is more “comfortable” with a person with visual impairment than they are with someone with another form of disability. Blindness does not seem as taboo of a subject as, for instance, schizophrenia or something of the like. Society tends to view people with mental disabilities as being “crazy” and as far from the “normate” as one could possibly stray. People with blindness are not viewed in the same light. However, on the other hand, blindness is not something I have ever had to deal with personally; I don’t even know anyone who is blind. This aspect of the work I’ll be doing with the Association is exciting, because I will be exposed to something that I really don’t know that much about, even as prevalent as blindness is.

-Excerpt from Jackie's: While walking through the organization, it was apparent that some of the people working there were enjoying their job, were joking, and laughing; however there were a few people that seemed as if they were uncomfortable with us there. I hope that it does not become and problem. I understand that some people can be uncomfortable when new people enter a controlled environment; I hope that we do not make these people uncomfortable. It is important to feel comfortable with your environment. There is also one other issue I feel may come up. Because we are only working once a week, I think that it may be harder for some people to open up to us. On our orientation there as one man who was very open and talkative about how he became blind and how he copes now. However I don’t think that most people working will be as open and vocal about their disability.

Exerpts from Service-Learning Journals:

-Excerpt from Lisa's second trip: At one point, Andrew, asked us what our majors were. When Caroline told him that she planned to major in Psychology, and possibly become a psychologist, he responded by saying “oh we would be great patients for you.” I found this to be a very interesting statement, and now that I think about it I find that it relates to the reading by Lennard Davis, “Constructing Normalcy.” Generally, people visit psychologists for a psychological problem, so for Andrew to claim that he would be a good patient reflects the fact that people with disabilities are not “normal.” The idea of what is “normal” has been constructed to create “problems” with those who have disabilities. Andrew cannot see, there is nothing mentally wrong with him, and I think that if he truly believes he needs to see a psychologist, then that is sad.

-Excerpt from Rachel's first visit: I am not sure how to relate my first experience at the association with my own life since we weren’t fully given the opportunity to help those that were in need. In that moment, though, I could still look around the production site and realize what lives these people have led. Some of the workers were stationed at the “pen production area” and you could tell that although this was such a humdrum job, they took it seriously and didn’t stop until the clock struck 4:00. Realizing how lucky I am to be a healthy, young woman.

-Excerpt from Alicia's first visit: The woman with whom I spent my two hours working alongside was Linda. Linda is in her early forties and an extremely fun lady to be around. She was born with a condition where the nerves in her eyes are not controlled and thus she could see, but could not control where she was looking. Now, she is completely blind in one eye and can only make out small images from the other. It was interesting how she expressed that having been able to once see and now unable to was probably the most difficult part about being blind, since she has to relearn and readjust to everything in life. As we sat there for two hours I truly enjoyed her company but the task became extremely mundane and under-stimulating, I cannot imagine boxing pens all day along, everyday. I felt extremely sorry for the employees, not simply because they were blind, but because this is the type of work they have been engaging in day after day, most of them for years. Linda was very open about her disability and told me it is extremely hard to find jobs when you are disabled, especially blind. Also, she talked about the low wages they receive and how many of the disabled (and non-disabled) are losing their jobs to people overseas and in Mexico who will work for lower pay. At this point I just wished I could say something encouraging, but the truth is I do not know if that is ever going to change and honestly I wish it would, but it seems the CEOs and people in charge care more about making their billions even if it means people are making five cents an hour and some in our own country are left with out work.

-Excerpt from Jackie's second visit: For most of our time at Tri County this week Amanda, Alicia and I were working together and not interacting with anyone else. A few people came over and said hi, however that was it. It wasn’t until our last 15 minutes that we were able to have some interaction. Having worked with John before, I knew some things about him. For basically those 15 minutes we talked about music and about his trip he is taking to Texas in two weeks. Whenever John talked about music he always gets very excited and tries to tell you everything he can about it. I think that it is awesome that he loves music that much. He says that he can feel the music and the vibrations that the speakers give off when he listens to it. It really makes me think what my life would be like without having my sights and relaying so much on my other senses.

Samples from Post-Service Reflections:

-Excerpt from Amanda's Post Reflection: Every time we were actually able to interact with the workers, I can honestly say that I believe that there was a reciprocal relationship between us. Not only were the workers helping us understand their condition and life better, but also we were able to act as an outlet for them to talk about their blindness. It is amazing how open they were all willing to be, and how much they were able to share in such a short amount of time. Because they understood that we were not there to judge them, the workers were able to talk about a lot of the things that bothered them about their current condition. Aside from the fact that many were never able to live their lives like “normal” people do (or at least how they believe that normal people do), I found that the biggest source of discomfort for them was that they were not treated as equals. One woman told me that she liked us because she didn’t feel as though we were “thinking mean things” about her and the other workers. We were able to become close to them and listen to them, even if only for a couple hours, while we helped them with their work for the day.

-Excerpt from Charlotte's Post Reflection: There is an endless list of the problems the visually impaired face in a “normative” society. Their impairments prohibit them from participating in many of society’s standards for a normal life. Something as simple as watching television or reading the newspaper is a frustrating, if not impossible task for members of this community. Employment, too, creates a difficult situation for the visually impaired. Requiring special computers with audio programs and Braille printers, the visually impaired are not ideal employees both productively and economically. The Tri-County Association for the Blind helps to overcome these obstacles for the visually impaired. Hearing aides and audio programs are provided to the community. Also, by employing those with the impairments, the Association allows them to fully function within the working world. Throughout the semester we have been discussing the presence of the impaired within a “normal” society. In Motherless Brooklyn, Lionel, was labeled as “freakshow” because his Tourettes differentiated him from others. In Fat, the fat man is described only as such—society is only concerned with his physical appearance, thus stripping him of his humanity. Through my experiences at the Tri-County Association for the Blind, I have learned that the visually impaired, too, are restricted in society, as their physical impairment overwhelms their identity.

Relevance of Non-Fiction Reading on Experience

Exerpts from Service Entries that describe the relationship between our non-fiction readings and our volunteer work:

Motherless Brooklyn

-Ecxerpt from Vonna's Journal Entries: When Todd and I were talking about previous places of employment, he mentioned that he used to be an Assistant Produce Manager at a grocery store near his house. This, coupled with his expression that he found his current job mundane helped me see that just like Lionel in Motherless Brooklyn and all people who are disabled, Todd is capable of much more than people without disabilities give him credit for. Many times in Motherless Brooklyn, people treat Lionel like he is less intelligent than someone who doesn’t have a disability, and I got the indication from my second volunteer experience that people like Todd have faced situations like this also.

-Excerpt from Rachel's Journal Entries: In relation to our discussions in class, this experience brought to me a new perspective at how hard Lionel had to work to prove his position as a detective in Motherless Brooklyn. The disabled workers at Tri-County Association for the Blind work extremely hard at what they do in order to prove themselves as competent employees. Like Lionel, every employee has to work extra hard in order to establish rank within the organization. I just thought it was interesting to see the comparison between the real life situation as opposed to the story told on the page.

-Excerpt from Charlotte's Journal Entries: Looking back at this experience, I am reminded of Motherless Brooklyn. As I read the novel, I found it strange that the people Lionel interacted with accepted his Tourettes so readily. I was always distracted by his symptoms and found it hard to understand how the other characters did not seem mind his outbursts. By working with the woman at the Tri-County Association for the Blind, I am beginning to understand that the disability does not define the person. I enjoyed talking with her, as I gradually became more comfortable interacting with her.

What's Eating Gilbert Grape

-Excerpt from Caroline's Journal Entries: While working at the Association, the mailman came and Jim asked me to tell him who was at the door. After the mailman left, Jim explained to us that sometimes people come into the building and are disrespectful. They try to take advantage of the fact that the workers are blind. I found this to be horrifying. It is hard to believe that people would actually do this. It led me to think back to our class discussions of What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, and how Gilbert would lift kids up to the window to make a mockery of his mother. The fact that people come into the building and take advantage of the blind workers is related to this example, because they too are making a mockery of the workers at the Association.

Related Links

http://www.tricountyblind.org/index.html -Homepage for the Tri-County Association for the Blind

http://www.nfb.org/ -National Federation for the Blind

http://www.afb.org/ -American Federation for the Blind

http://www.acb.org/ -American Council of the Blind

http://www.delcoblind.org/ -Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired

http://www.pablind.org/MemberAgencies.htm

-Pennsylvania Association for the Blind

http://www.abledata.com/abledata.cfm?pageid=113573&top=16971&sectionid=19326&stateorganizations=1 -List of centers across the United States

http://www.rfbd.org/ -Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic

http://www.afbp.org/ -Action for Blind People

http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/04/02/seeing.no.limits.ap/index.html] -Article on CNN.com about a young man who is blind and has receintly become a surgeon.

Tri-County Association in the News

http://vor.net/NoMedicaidCuts.htm -Over 1000 organizations tell Bush they are opposed to Medicaid cuts and caps, including the Tri-County Association for the blind.

http://www.culturalpartnerships.org/community/2002bridgesgrants.asp -2002 Building Bridges Mini-Grant Awards

http://www.tcuwny.org/aboutus.html -Tri-County United Way celebrated its 75th Anniversary