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Inside
July 10, 2007
1
History Note
“An ‘invalid’ is not one whose body doesn’t function, but one who doesn’t use what he or she has.”
■ Directory of Organizations—p. 7 ■ Mental Health Legislation—p. 3 ■ Fringe Festival Listings—p. 14
— Journalist from Uzbekistan Page 2 Nonprofit Org. U.S. Postage PAID Mpls. MN Permit No. 4766
Volume 18, Number 7
Minnesota’s Disability
Community Newspaper
July 10, 2007
Not Worlds Apart Uzbek Visitors See Similarities Between their Disability Newspaper and Access Press by Laurie Eckblad Anderson exchange via the visitors’ Russian interpreters. All the Uzbekistanis had connections to their disability community. Two of them had a special interest in Access Press because they publish disability newspapers of their own.
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n June 11, three visitors from Uzbekistan visited Access Press to learn about the role of a disability newspaper in the U.S. They were guests of the Minnesota International
Center’s International Visitor Leadership Program, and Access Press was just one of their many stops while in Minnesota. Hosted that afternoon by Access Press editor Tim Benjamin, the group had a lively
We Want to Talk about Ourselves Benjamin met with Larisa Khodjaeva, Oibek Isakov, and Guli Abaskhanova. Khodjaeva took the lead, asking about key details related to publish-
ing Access Press. She wanted to know everything from its circulation (11,000) to the cost of a subscription ($25). She also noted that due to her interest in publishing, this meeting with Access Press was a key stop for her on the group’s overall itinerary.
Talk about Ourselves, a glossy, colorful newspaper published on behalf of children and teens with disabilities (pictured). When Benjamin noted that it would cost a lot more to print Access Press in a similar manner, Khodjaeva said they do it because that makes their paper more attractive to its target Khodjaeva then shared some group: kids. The paper’s cirmore background on herself. culation is about 1,000. She is affiliated with the Research Center for Disabled Upon viewing a sample of Children in Tashkent and is Khodjaeva’s paper, Benjamin the chief editor of We Want to was interested to see articles published in both Russian and English. When asked what disabilities are common in Uzbekistan, she responded that it is a mix of physical and mental disabilities, and that diabetes is a huge problem in her country. In fact, among the interesting list of sponsors for Khodjaeva’s paper are two companies that produce insulin: Novo Nordisk and Lilly. Novo is doing research on the prevalence of diabetes in Uzbekistan; Lilly is providing the Fair Labor Standards Act funds for a camp for kids with exempted Ms. Coke from its disabilities related to diabecoverage because she was a tes. “personal services” worker, and dismissed the case. Even with financial backing from sponsors, Khodjaeva and Coke appealed to the 2nd Cir- Benjamin agreed that it is alcuit Court of appeals, which ways a struggle to find enough overturned the district court money for their papers. And decision. They agreed with Ms. since both are always interCoke that the regulation, as ested in a good story, they interpreted by the DOL, was agreed to provide each other unenforceable. Long Island with articles via an e-mail exCare appealed the case to the change. Supreme Court. At this point, the DOL issued an “advisory Dignity memorandum” to further ex- Soon Oibek Isakov took over plain its interpretation of the the questioning. He is the chair regulation that Ms. Coke, and of the Disabled People’s Sociother personal care assistants, ety of Uzbekistan and is also were exempt from coverage affiliated with a disability by the Fair Labor Standards newspaper. The English transAct. The Supreme Court sent lation of the name of his paper the case back to the Court of is Dignity. It publishes 3,000 Appeals and asked them to copies twice a month, and its revisit their decision, taking yearly budget is about $10,000 into consideration this memo- (U.S.); this is about the same randum. The Court of Appeals cost as printing one month of found that this “interpretation Access Press. Bad Decision - cont. on p. 6
Court Underestimates Value Of Direct Support Long Island Care at Home vs. Coke: a Bad Decision and a Call to Action by Kathleen Hagen
E
velyn Coke immigrated to the U.S from Jamaica. For 20 years she worked for Long Island Care at Home as a personal care assistant. The agency provides personal care assistants to seniors and persons with disabilities. During that time, Coke often stayed with her customers overnight, or more than 24 hours, when another personal care assistant didn’t show up, or when a customer needed more care than their benefits would pay for. She was never paid a higher wage than $7.00 an hour, got no overtime for hours worked more than eight hours a day, and received no health insurance benefits. Then, in 2001, Ms. Coke was hit by a car and suffered injuries that precluded her from performing this work. Ms. Coke went to see a lawyer, who thought that under the Fair Labor Standards Act, she should have been paid for overtime work. She filed suit
in 2002 and now, five years later, has finally reached the end of the road—a dead end. The Supreme Court unanimously ruled to deny her the compensation she sought. Ms. Coke, at 73, has several serious disabilities, including diabetes, which has led to kidney failure and her need for dialysis three times-a-week.
to exclude from coverage only companionship service workers employed by a third party to provide services to someone in his/her home. Ms. Coke argued that this second more exclusionary amendment was unenforceable, and that Congress never meant for such domestic workers to be so excluded. Thus, Ms. Coke requested compensation for the years of unThis case had a long proce- paid overtime. dural history. The Fair Labor Standards Act was amended in Ms. Coke faced stiff opposi1974 to provide minimum wage tion. Rallying behind Long Isprotection and overtime com- land Care were various assopensation for domestic service ciations representing the inemployees. However, the terests of agencies who hire amendment exempted from and provide personal care ascoverage certain kinds of do- sistants. They argued that if mestic service employees, in- they were forced to pay overcluding workers providing time compensation, their costs “companionship services.” At would rise to billions of dolthe time, the Department of lars, either putting them out of Labor (DOL) established regu- business or preventing them lations, including some that ap- from providing assistance to peared to be contradictory to persons in their homes. the amendment’s intent. One of these regulations would seem The District Court found that
The Dignity is printed in black and white to save money. The relatively high cost of a subscription is a serious problem. The average pension for a person with a disability in Uzbekistan is 300,000 som (Uzbekistani currency) per year; a subscription to Dignity costs 10,000 som per year (3.3 % of annual income)! In comparison, Access Press is 10 times more affordable for a person on a fixed income in Minnesota; the SSI annual payment is $7476 ($623 monthly), and a subscription to Access Press costs $25 (0.33 % of annual income). Isakov’s paper is of a social and political nature, dealing with issues important to people with disabilities. However, the paper also includes articles on general criminal activity, because that is what draws readers in. Among those the paper
“Dignity also includes articles on general criminal activity, because that is what draws readers in.” hopes to attract with these crime teasers are people without disabilities; Isakov believes that the able-bodied fear disability, forgetting that it can happen to anyone. Dignity welcomes submissions from people with disabilities, who are paid if their articles are used. In general, Isakov believes that people with disabilities should participate in society as full citizens and accept the accompanying responsibility. A colleague of his in Uzbekistan says an “invalid” is not one whose body doesn’t function, but one who doesn’t use what he or she has. The two papers are remarkably similar. Like Access Press, the goal of Dignity is to Uzbekistan - cont. on p. 12