http://www.unitedspinal.org/publication ... i-studies/
The studies are in our backyard. Take advantage of the opportunity to help others that have sustained A spinal cord injury/disease and be paid or compensated for your time.
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( 3 / 174 )2009 Independence Expo - The consumer experience for people with disabilities and aging Americans is scheduled for New York . Admission, workshops, parking, and raffle are all free.
The Consumer Experience For Persons With Disabilities & Aging Americans
Long Island New York
June 27 & 28
Suffolk Community College
Sports & Exhibition Complex
Crooked Hill Road
Brentwood , NY 11717
What’s Happening At The Independence Expo?
Exhibits That Offer Something For Everyone
Hot Consumer Workshops
Free Consumer Workshops 2009 Independence Expo
Need to know or want to know- Independence Expo Consumer Workshops will connect you with your Independence .
Top it off with free admission, free parking and great venues making 2009 Independence Expo the consumer event to attend this year.
Exhibitor and Sponsorship Information http://www.independenceexpo.org/
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( 2.9 / 138 )The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has voted to revise its regulations to conform to changes made by the ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA) of 2008, which would make it easier for an individual seeking protection under the ADA to establish that he or she has a disability.
PRESS RELEASE
6-17-09
COMMISSION VOTES TO REVISE RULES TO CONFORM TO ADA AMENDMENTS ACT
New Regulations Would Make it Easier for People to Establish Disability Under ADA
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) voted today to revise its regulations to conform to changes made by the ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA) of 2008, which would make it easier for an individual seeking protection under the ADA to establish that he or she has a disability.
The Commission voted 2-1 to adopt the rules changes, at a public meeting this morning at the agency’s Washington headquarters. The five-member body has two vacancies.
The rules changes approved today represent an initial stage in the regulatory process and must next go to the Office of Management and Budget for review, and to federal agencies pursuant to Executive Order 12067, without public comment.
“In approving these proposed regulations, the EEOC today is taking a significant step toward returning the ADA to the broad and strong civil rights statute that Congress originally intended it to be,” said EEOC Acting Chairman Stuart J. Ishimaru. “The proposed regulations will permit individuals with disabilities to participate to the fullest extent possible in the American workplace.”
Acting EEOC Vice Chair Christine M. Griffin said, “Today’s vote is historic. These regulations will serve to shift the focus of the courts from further narrowing the definition of disability and putting it back to where Congress intended when the ADA was enacted in 1990. Courts should now focus on whether discrimination based on disability is occurring in the workplace. The protections afforded by the ADA AA and these new regulations are important for all workers including our returning wounded warriors who certainly deserve the right to re-enter a workforce free of discrimination.”
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), an antidiscrimination statute, was signed into law in July 1990. The EEOC is responsible for enforcing Title I of the ADA , which prohibits employment discrimination against individuals with disabilities. The statute requires employers to make reasonable accommodations to employees and job applicants with disabilities— defined as people with mental or physical impairments that substantially limit a major life activity, persons with a record of a disability, or who, while not actually disabled, are regarded as disabled.
The ADA Amendments Act, which went into effect Jan. 1, 2009, makes important changes to the definition of the term "disability" by rejecting the holdings in several Supreme Court decisions and portions of EEOC's prior ADA regulations. The effect of these changes is to make it easier for an individual seeking protection under the ADA to establish that he or she has a disability as defined by the ADA . The ADAAA emphasizes that the definition of disability should be construed in favor of broad coverage of individuals to the maximum extent permitted by the terms of the ADA and generally shall not require extensive analysis.
The ADAAA also states that Congress expects the EEOC to revise its regulations to conform to changes made by Act, and expressly authorizes the EEOC to do so.
The EEOC is responsible for enforcing federal laws prohibiting employment discrimination. Further information about the EEOC is available on its web site at www.eeoc.gov.
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( 3 / 111 )June 17, 2009, 10:20 am
Please Give the Disabled Your Seat. Or Else.
By A. G. Sulzberger
Link:
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/ ... -give-the- disabled-your-seat-or-else
It is the usual reminder, just a little firmer than in the past. This
week, as it has done every couple of years, New York City Transit is
starting an advertising campaign asking New Yorkers to remember to “please
offer a seat” to disabled passengers on buses and subways.
There was a time — who knows if it really existed — when such civility was
assumed. However, the new posters on subways and buses give riders an
extra prod: “It’s not only polite, it’s the law.”
“It’s the first time we’ve really stressed this,” said Paul J. Fleuranges,
vice president for corporate communications at New York City Transit, the
largest arm of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Those who
decline to give up a seat on request face up to a $50 fine, he said. (The
new campaign also warns that “not all disabilities are visible.”)
As long as there has been public transportation, there has been grumbling
about healthy young men taking a load off while the pregnant, the old and
the infirm stand by.
Recently, some bloggers have chronicled their own troubles securing a seat
while injured or pregnant.
“We’ve become less civil,” said Lawrence Carter-Long, executive director
of the Disabilities Network of New York City, who has cerebral palsy and
walks with a cane. “I don’t think it’s malice,” he said. “But in a city
like New York, where you put your head down and just try to get from point
A to point B, it’s even more of a problem.”
Then again, maybe instead of quietly fuming, those in need of a seat
should simply ask for one. In 1972, the iconoclastic psychology professor
Stanley Milgram used students to gauge the generosity of subway riders,
finding that 68 percent of riders stood up when asked, “Excuse me, may I
have your seat?” In 2004, 13 out of 15 riders stood up when two reporters
from The New York Times replicated the exercise.
Mr. Fleuranges said it would be hard to gauge the effectiveness of the
campaign. “We don’t have the staff to monitor that,” he said in an e-mail
message. “Where we hope this campaign has an impact is in the area of
customer education — in that our riders understand why these seats are
made available and hope, if asked, they provide the seat to a fellow
customer who requests it.”
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( 3 / 62 )Justice For All Action Network Meet with Presidential Staff
by Andrew Imparato, AAPD President and CEO
June 11, 2009
Justice For All Action Network Steering Committee (members listed below) at the White House with Kareem Dale.
Last week, the Steering Committee of a new national disability-led coalition called the Justice for All Action Network (JFAAN) met for an hour with two senior White House officials to discuss some of our common policy priorities. Attending for the White House were Kareem Dale, Special Assistant to the President for Disability Policy; and Jeff Crowley, Director of the National AIDS Office and senior adviser on disability issues within the Domestic Policy Council. Attending for JFAAN were Kelly Buckland, the new Executive Director and former Board President of the National Council on Independent Living; Bruce Darling, a national organizer with ADAPT and Executive Director of the Center for Disability Rights in Rochester NY; Chester Finn, President of Self Advocates Becoming Empowered (accompanied by Karen Topper of SABE); Nancy Bloch, Executive Director of the National Association of the Deaf; Brenda Battat, Executive Director of the Hearing Loss Association of America; Ron Brown, Second Vice President of the National Federation of the Blind and President of NFB of Indiana; Eric Bridges, Director of Advocacy and Governmental Affairs for the American Council of the Blind; Gary Arnold, Vice President for Public Relations for Little People of America; Ari Ne'eman, Founder and President of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network; Dan Fisher, steering committee member of the National Coalition of Mental Health Consumer Survivor Organizations; and Andy Imparato, President and CEO of the American Association of People with Disabilities.
Imparato kicked off the meeting by describing how JFAAN came into being, and Fisher and Finn talked about the importance of working with disability-led organizations for the White House. Ne'eman and Bridges touched on some of the disability community’s priorities for health care reform, and Darling pressed on the need to end the institutional bias as part of health care reform and some of our coalition's priorities for housing policy. Rob Sweezy, an attendee invited by Dale to represent an Amerigroup-funded National Advisory Board chimed in on the importance of home and community-based long term services and supports. Ne'eman, Bloch and Sweezy then touched on some of our education policy priorities, including ideas for addressing the problems identified in the recent GAO report documenting widespread school abuse of children through aversives, restraint and seclusion; followed by Battat and Brown talking about our technology and transportation policy priorities. Imparato quickly referenced a draft JFAAN employment policy paper, which Dale expressed an interest in reviewing. The group thanked Dale and Crowley for their time and expressed an interest in quarterly meetings, something that Dale and Crowley were not willing to commit to at this time. The JFAAN attendees felt that this was an historic meeting and look forward to engaging with other leaders in the Administration and in Congress moving forward.
The Justice for All Action Network has weekly one-hour calls and is in the process of organizing working groups on different coalition priority areas. There are currently working groups on employment policy, health care reform, and grassroots organizing. We will send out regular updates on the network’s activities on the Justice for All listserv. Anyone interested in participating on the weekly calls or one of the working groups, please contact Sarah Peterson, Grassroots Organizer and JFA Moderator, at AAPD at jfa@aapd.com.
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