Patti's Blog - Advocate for Elders, People with Disabilities and Their Families

Moms pay $1,000-a-day to hire disabled members to skip lines at Disney

Excerpt from: Fox News (click for full article)

Please see Patti's other post about this event here

 

Forget the FastPasses.  Apparently the secret to skipping the long lines at Disney World is to hire a disabled person. 

The New York Post is reporting that some deep-pocketed New York City moms are hiring a motorized scooter-bound guide to pose as a family member so they and their kids can jump to the front of the lines.

According to the report, families book tours through an outfit called Dream Tours in Florida, which on its website claims to provide "quality based, memorable, and affordable vacations, to people with special needs."  The Disney guide charges $130 an hour, or $1,040 for an eight-hour day, citing a Manhattan mom who claims she hired a tour guide using a motorized scooter.

“You can’t go to Disney without a tour concierge,’’ she told the Post. “This is how the 1 percent does Disney.”

 

Disability in Neo-Liberal America

Excerpt from: Planet of the Blind (click for full article)

 

An article in today's New York Post, that deleterious rag, offers the provoking headline: "Rich Manhattan Moms Hire Handicapped Tour Guides so Kids Can Cut Lines at Disney World". Gotcha! By God! What a scandal! Something's rotten in the Magic Kingdom! I smell perfervid mendacity and liniment. Christ! I'm about to faint. And then I read: "Some wealthy Manhattan moms have figured out a way to cut the long lines at Disney World — by hiring disabled people to pose as family members so they and their kids can jump to the front, The Post has learned."  "Hortense, get the smelling salts! The cripples are conning Minnie and Mickey! Help, Hortense, I have the vapors!"

Yep, there's some real investigative journalism. Forget the dubious claim that people with disabilities are posing as family members--it might actually be true, but let's be clear--the tour guide in question who uses a wheel chair, has the right to earn an honest living. If her wheelchair gets her and her charges to the head of a line, well, whoop dee do. The article is piffle, jazzed up, electrified, powered by the oldest ableist outrage of them all--the notion that there are people faking disability.

For developmentally disabled, a tough job market

Excerpt from: NECN.com (click for full article)

 

Lawrence man Ryan Banning is in every sense of the word an entrepreneur. For more than a decade, Banning, 36, has operated his own business, Ryan's Vending Service, managing a dozen or so vending machines in Lawrence.

He's always looking to expand, he said as he loaded the soda and snack machines at the Lawrence Municipal Airport recently.

And the bottom line for Ryan, who has Down syndrome, is that he enjoys the work and turns a profit.

"He's earning, he's paying taxes," said Martha, his mother, who helped conceive of the business idea when Ryan finished high school. "It's been a really good fit for him."

Where to Find Telecommuting Jobs

Excerpt from: Disability Blog (click for full article)

 

Each year, the number of companies that embrace the concept of employees working from home increases. A U.S. Census Bureau report found that the percentage of workers who worked at home at least one day a week increased from 7 percent in 1997 to 9.5 percent in 2010.

That same report found that employees who work at home reported working the same amount of hours as in-office counterparts with the same level of productivity. Workplace flexibility was once considered just a perk for employees, but employers are now seeing the benefits of it for them. People who work from home save businesses money by using their own resources and utilities. They also tend to be more loyal to the company because their own schedules and needs are accommodated.

People with disabilities face fewer obstacles to workplace success when they are given telecommuting options. The technology exists for many jobs to be done partially, or completely, from a home office. For some, being self-employed is a viable option. For others who are more interested in landing a steady paycheck and benefits like health insurance, finding a larger employer with telecommute options is a better option.

People with disabilities face gap in higher education employment

Excerpt from: Minnesota Daily (click for full article)

 

Sandra Buchholz has had difficulty landing a job because she’s deaf.

Some employers wouldn’t hire her because her deafness would make it hard to communicate, said Buchholz, who works as an American Sign Language instructor at the University of Minnesota.

“I would say that there are a lot of deaf people out there who have a tough time getting a job because of their disability,” she said through an interpreter.

Nationwide, there’s a large gap in the employment of people with mental or physical disabilities — the unemployment rate for people with disabilities is almost double the rate for those without, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

Turkey Plant Ordered To Pay Mentally Disabled Workers $240M After Years Of Awful Conditions

Excerpt from: Consumerist (click for full article)

 

An Iowa jury recently handed down what could be the largest verdict in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s history, including a judge’s order that a turkey plant must pay 32 mentally disabled men $240 million. The jury found that Henry’s Turkey Service had violated the Americans with Disabilities Act in paying the workers $0.41 an hour while reportedly making them live in awful conditions and subjecting them to physical abuse and neglect.

After four years of working on the case, the EEOC attorney and the families of the men laid out five days of testimony about the working and living conditions the workers endured, reports the Quad City Times. The judge awarded each of the 32 workers $7.5 million for emotional and punitive damages.

“For the first time since 2009, the public, as represented by the jury, not only got to hear the whole story about these men, but fully understood the depth of the human experience they suffered,” said EEOC attorney Robert Canino.

Mentally disabled Iowa plant workers awarded $240 million for years of abuse

Excerpt from: The Oakland Press (click for full article)

 

An Iowa jury on Wednesday awarded a total of $240 million to 32 mentally disabled Iowa turkey processing plant workers for what government lawyers described as years of around-the-clock abuse and discrimination by the Texas company that oversaw their care, work and lodging.

The federal jury in Davenport determined that Henry’s Turkey Service, of Goldthwaite, Tex., violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by creating a hostile living and working environment and imposing discriminatory conditions of employment. The jury also found that the company acted with “malice or reckless indifference” to the men’s civil rights.

Jurors awarded each of the men $7.5 million apiece after a weeklong trial that featured emotional testimony from social workers who described the physical and verbal abuse they suffered. That includes $5.5 million apiece in compensatory damages for their pain and suffering and $2 million apiece to punish the company for knowingly violating the law.

Job hunt a struggle for students with mental disabilities

Excerpt from: CBC News (click for full article)

 

People who work with students with mental disabilities say more needs to be done to strengthen resources after they graduate from high school.

Lauren Emanuel, the head of the learning centre department at Sackville High School, says it’s rare to see a graduate transition straight from high school into a job.

“There could be a couple of years delay between when they graduate high school and when an agency is able to support them,” she said.

Emanuel said some families are left scrambling to piece together a meaningful future for their children. She wants employers to be more receptive to graduates with learning disabilities.

“They do a lot of jobs that others aren’t interested in. But they pride themselves on their work. We train them to be there on time and ask questions,” said Emanuel.

EEOC Sues Florida Hospital for Discriminating Against Doctor with Epilepsy

Excerpt from: Disability Law (click for full article)

 

Baptist Health South Florida, a Miami-based hospital system, violated federal law when it refused a reasonable scheduling request from a newly hired physician with epilepsy at its Doctor's Hospital location in Coral Gables, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) charged in a lawsuit filed today. 

According to the EEOC's suit, a new hire, Dr. Lianette Campos-Sackley, applied for a position at Doctor's Hospital's Gamma Knife Center as a general medical practitioner under the direction of Dr. Aizik Wolf. During her initial interview with Dr. Wolf, Dr. Campos-Sackley notified him that she had epilepsy, which required her to not exceed an eight-hour work day. Dr. Wolf agreed to Dr. Campos-Sackley's scheduling request and, after she interviewed with other members of the Doctor's Hospital staff, she was ultimately hired.

However, as soon as she began working, Dr. Wolf altered the pre-determined schedule and demanded that Dr. Campos-Sackley work additional hours, which caused her health to rapidly deteriorate. Dr. Campos-Sackley consulted with hospital management and renewed her request for a reasonable accommodation in the form of a modified work schedule, but the request was denied. Within a few days, Dr. Campos-Sackley was terminated.

Intellectually disabled workers not getting superannuation

Excerpt from: ABC News (click for full article)

 

Superannuation rules brought in to protect businesses mean that those earning less than $450 a month do not qualify for superannuation payments.  The rules have consequences for much of the disabled workforce.

Emma White, 30, has Down's Syndrome and wants to work more, but at the moment she does not earn enough to get super. She is just starting a traineeship, but her mother Judy is worried about the longer term.

"It's a great unknown. It's something we just have no idea how that will work out," she said.

"It's alright while we are here, advocating for her. Once we are not here, I am sure that will all just fall into a heap."

The Endeavour Foundation is the largest employer of people with intellectual disabilities in Australia. It pays its staff members' superannuation, but CEO David Barbagallo says it is tough for disabled workers out in the open job market.

"The most financially vulnerable people are not having a little bit put away for a time when they most [need it]," he said.

Mr Barbagallo says the Government needs to change the laws.