----- Original Message -----
From: joe harcz Comcast
To: Lt. Gov. Brian Calley
Cc: Mike Zimmer LARA DSA ; Ed Rodgers BSBP Dir. ; Larry Posont NFBMI Pres. ;
Egan, Paul ; Sarah Gravetti MISILC DNM ; Rodney Craig ED MSILC ; Marlene Malloy
MCRS Dir. ; Kelley, Brian L. ; Elmer Cerano MPAS ; MARK CODY mpas pair ; MARK
MCWILLIAMS MPAS
Sent: Tuesday, March 22, 2016 9:53 AM
Subject: what is bsbp and other orgs doing?
March 22 2016 Again BSBP What Are You Doing?
Paul Joseph Harcz, Jr.
1365 E. Mt. Morris Rd.
Mt. Morris, MI 48458
joeharcz@xxxxxxxxxxx
810-516-5262
Re: Getting information is like pulling teeth
To:
Lt. Gov. Brian Calley
Mike Zimmer, Director LARA
Edward Rodgers, II Director, Mich. Bureau of Services to Blind Persons
(Via e-mail)
All,
I point your attention to the short note from the Genesee County Braille and
Talking Book Library as follows:
““Joe,
Per your request, GDL Talking Book Center enrollment is 444.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me with any other questions.
Thanks,
Dave
David Conklin
Director
Genesee District Library
(810) 230-3335 Office
(810) 732-1161 Fax
dconklin@xxxxxxxxxx
Genesee District Library Headquarters
4195 W. Pasadena Avenue
Flint, MI 48504
“
This information took me about a week to gather and doesn’t identify even a
small amount of the legally blind in this county for even by National Library
Services estimates about 1.5 percent of the population would be eligible for
these services. Estimates of legally blind alone as stated before by the
National Eye Institute are 1.9 percent of the population. Regardless we’ve seen
BSBP scramble around trying to allegedly contact 36 people who are blind in
Flint, and they didn’t even use this resource which is, by the way a division
of BSBP? How outragiously incompetent is the leadership of BSBP and other state
organizations perportedly serving people with disabilities when this one
federally funded agency doesn’t even use the resources it has, let alone expand
the search for blind persons which it is supposed to do everyday and not just
in emergencies? And let me remind you that I’ve been whistleblowing about this
stuff for years and even was arrested for attempting to enter, and distribute
leaflets at the so-called phony ADA Celebration of my civil rights law on the
State Capitol Lawn on September 17, 2015. (And let me remind you all this
county is still under a state of emergency!) Some Americans with Disabilities
Act “celebration” that was. And one of the things I was protesting is the fact
that even BSBP, let alone other state agencies do not remit accessible
information in a timely manner, in alternate formats, even upon request let
alone affirmatively.
The BTBL is one resource not used daily for reproducing information in audio
and Braille. Yet it is not used and even the data base hasn’t been used to
contact people who are blind dealing with the Flint water crisis.
Nothing frankly has been done. Yet, Mr. Rodgers has bloviated in the media
about all his moribund agency has done. There is no, and I repeat no
credibility here.
People are being poisoned, and property values are collapsed in Flint and
surrounding areas. That includes the blind population. That includes others
with other disabilities.
And we’ve got highly paid folks like Rodgers passing the buck and doing CYA
while they and their minions actually commit documented fraud!
Meanwhile a 63 year old blind man from Genesee County working with no pay at
all and under extreme harassment by the State and its agents gets information
out and finds resources. What is wrong with you people?
You work for us. You work for citizens of Michigan and that includes citizens
with disabilities and that includes those of us who are blind.
Instead of action, or even a simple apology all I get is FOIA delays and spin.
Not to mention the persecution concerning my own civil rights on my own civil
rights day.
Now, it is time to reconcile and make these things right. It is time to make us
all whole.
And it is long since time to clean up your acts.
Sincerely,
Paul “Joe” Harcz, Jr.
Citizen with Disabilities
Cc: several
