Intro: Welcome to the Nation's Blind Podcast presented by the National Federation of the Blind, the transformative membership and advocacy organization of blind Americans. Live the life you want.
Anil Lewis: Hello and welcome to the Nation's Blind Podcast. And you are correct, this is not Melissa Riccobono, she's not able to join us today, but I am Anil Lewis, the forever faithful co-host when Melissa is here. And I have a forever faithful co-host joining me as well, Chris Danielson?
Chris Danielsen: Yes, that's me. How is everybody in podcast land?
Anil Lewis: I stole your entry by giving your name.
Chris Danielsen: I know. I know. And I am annoyed about it, but I will soldier on.
Anil Lewis: There you go.
Chris Danielsen: I will soldier on.
Anil Lewis: I know you will.
Chris Danielsen: We all have to struggle through despite setbacks. So how are you Anil?
Anil Lewis: I'm doing great. Doing really good. This 2024 thing is happening. A lot of stuff going on in life, but overall I'm doing great. How about yourself?
Chris Danielsen: Doing well myself. I cannot complain.
Anil Lewis: Speaking of complaining, is that a good segue?
Chris Danielsen: Speaking of complaining and complaints, yeah, yeah, we are going to talk about complaints, but not the kind of complaints usually that we'll usually think of. So I guess we'll go ahead and let our guest introduce himself because I'll mispronounce his name if he doesn't introduce himself.
Anil Lewis: To all of our listeners, please, let me introduce Mr. Sanho Steele-Luchard. See, he's probably impressed that I actually said his name. I usually like to introduce him as Sanho Steele Lockhart, but it's all good. Sanho, welcome to the Nation's Blind podcast.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Yes, thank you for having me. You poor things. Also, just once and for all. I'm going to say Sanho Steele-Louchart. No D.
Anil Lewis: Luchard. No D. Oh-
Sanho Steele-Louchart: You still did it incorrect. That's okay, that's fine. I forgive you. I am an attorney and the legal program coordinator here at the National Federation of the Blind, and so I'm very often someone's first and primary point of contact when they come to us for any kind of legal assistance or advice.
Anil Lewis: So back to complaints. So it is not about complaining, but sometimes we do have issues that we need to deal with. So this podcast is going to be dedicated to the legal advocacy work that the Federation does on a regular basis. So not only are we going to talk about the strategies behind our legal work, give you some samples of some of the stuff we do in this space, but also talk about the overall goal that we have of teaching individuals to be their own self-advocates. So, this is going to be one of those podcasts that could be used for training.
Chris Danielsen: Exactly. And also for a little myth-busting too, because some people think we sue, sue, sue, and that's all we do.
Anil Lewis: Yeah. And we make lots of money suing.
Chris Danielsen: Yeah, lots of money suing people. Yeah.
Anil Lewis: If only it was true. If only it was true.
Chris Danielsen: If only, if only. So with that in mind, Sanho, why don't you start off talking about the legal program and what it's purpose and strategy is?
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Sure, thank you. So this is a nationwide legal program. We are reaching all corners of the country, and what we're really doing is we're trying to do a three-prong approach. So conversation, negotiation, litigation, and 95 plus percent of the time a conversation is pretty much what it takes to be able to solve people's problems. And inside of that, we teach people a whole lot about self-advocacy. What does that look like? How do you do emotional work and the practical work to be able to converse your way through a problem in most circumstances? Once someone has done that, once they've gone ahead and done as much of the groundwork as they can, they've shaken the tree of their various resources to see what falls out. Then we can have another conversation about negotiation or litigation. So negotiation is where both sides come to the table and they discuss what exactly it is that the blind person needs. Okay.
And we're looking at, we might not get everything. This might not be a panacea, but we can probably get a considerable length of the way to where we want to be so that way the blind person's rights are being met under the law. And if that doesn't work, if the other side doesn't operate in good faith or something's going terribly wrong with that process, then perhaps we look at litigation, but litigation or suing people, that really is a last resort because it takes years. It's extraordinarily expensive. It is not the financial windfall many people think that it is. Often, we either do not gain any money or we might gain a thousand dollars in net over what it is that we spent on attorney's fees, court costs, that kind of thing. And so really and truly, we focus as much as humanly possible on conversation and negotiation before we get to litigation. And even those cases that go to court typically would end up settling out anyway. And I could say more about self-advocacy. So you just let me know when it's a good time to do that.
Anil Lewis: Well, I like the way you broke down the three phases, but I do think it's important for our listeners to know that believe it or not, most of our advocacy is done without litigation. We are much better at being partners when we find out that there are problems that exist. I know that a lot of, I'll say some of our members, not a lot of our members, some of our members who really like to think that we're the legal power in this world, they come automatically with us, sue them. And part of our job is just to talk them through how we can actually have a conversation, as you say, and sometimes enter into some degree of negotiation to get to a place, because many times when we're looking at issues around discrimination or lack of access, it's not intended by the offending party. It's just out of ignorance.
And sometimes it's just a matter of education. Sometimes it's just a matter of us telling them this is a tool that you can use to fix this accessibility problem. And we resolve so many more of our issues through that process than litigation. And I think it's also important to know that, again, we have a strategy behind it. A lot of people say, well, why won't the NFB provide me a lawyer? But they provided this other person a lawyer, and if that was the case, we would not, as you stated, litigation is very expensive. We would not have enough resources to provide everyone an attorney.
Chris Danielsen: So that said, Sanho, and you touched on part of it, which is if a party is not acting in good faith or is not willing to negotiate, but beyond that, how do we decide what cases to bring when we actually need to bring a case?
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Thank you for asking. So the first test that we look at is, is this either a blind applicant or is it on behalf of a blind applicant? Maybe the sighted parent of a blind child? If the person is not blind, some degree of blindness, then we're not going to be able to work on the case, or if the issue is not related to their blindness, that's the next test. So for instance, if the underlying issue is not blindness, if it is a contract dispute between neighbors or between a business owner and a third party vendor, but they just happen to be blind, well then we're not going to be able to take that case. We handle civil rights issues for blind people where blindness is fundamentally at issue. That is the thing that we are putting in front of a judge. And so that might look like complaints under the Americans with Disabilities Act.
That might look like complaints under the Rehabilitation Act or the Fair Housing Act, or it might even be a family law case where someone's children have been removed solely on the basis of their blindness, but it needs to be a civil rights issue where blindness is the crux of what we're discussing. Next, we look at what have they done in the self-advocacy arena? And this gives me an opportunity to talk a bit more about that. We want to know, have they networked with other blind people? Have they gone to their state's, what's called a protection and advocacy organization or their P&A? Usually that's going to be disability rights in certain name of state. Have they gone to legal aid in their area if they're low income or if they're a senior, have they been denied by these entities, either because the entities were at capacity or because they didn't have any expertise in the subject matter? But we want to know that the person has gone to those resources in their area before they've come to us.
And it's not because we're trying to say we can't give them services or anything like that. It is literally just have you done your due diligence rather than coming to us first every single time. And then what we look at after that is are we able to make a difference? Are we going to move the needle from 5% chances of victory to 15%, or removing it from 30% chance of victory to 70% chance of victory? Because that's where we see the sea change. And then the final thing that we look at is will this impact just that one individual or will this impact blind people nationwide? We need to be doing that impact work because unfortunately we get so many hundreds more applications every year than we can reasonably take for representation. And if we're not doing that impact work, we're spending time on an individual's case that doesn't help other blind people where we could be spending that time and energy helping all blind people.
Anil Lewis: So Sanho, let me ask you so that our listeners are not going to misinterpret. When you were describing 5%, 15% victory, are you stating that the federation only pursues litigation with the greatest odds of winning?
Sanho Steele-Louchart: No. No. I appreciate you clarifying. I just mean that we want to make sure whatever the chances of success are, that we are maximizing them to the point that we're really making a difference for that individual and for blind people generally. No, it's not about, we'll only take slam dunks, not by a long shot. We take a ton of cases where we introduce either novel legal theories or cutting edge legal theories, and we always strategize to make sure they're as sound as humanly possible, but we're also not afraid to push the envelope a bit to get blind people what they need.
Anil Lewis: So we're looking at making a significant change in that person's life, but also as you said with your last point, really systemic change in what we do as well. So we can't go out and just advocate for one individual where it's going to benefit only that one individual when there's an opportunity to use those same resources to create systemic change that will help multiple individuals.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Exactly.
Chris Danielsen: And I think that systemic change also really goes into our settlement strategy. So talk about what we do when we negotiate settlements, and what I'm thinking about here is you can go to nfb.org/legal and you can see a lot of our legal settlements and you can read them. And it's wonderful bedtime reading, I have to say, reading legal agreements, it's absolutely terrific for-
Anil Lewis: As spoken by a retired lawyer. Yeah.
Chris Danielsen: Yeah, yeah. A recovering lawyer. But why is that important that the settlements are public?
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Two reasons, Chris. The first is that we want other people to not have to reinvent the wheel. We want other people to be able to look at what we've done and say, you know what? I can do that too. And that can ultimately, in many cases, be a form of self-advocacy to say, here's what other blind people are doing. Here's what blind people are doing around the country. The other reason that we want to make those public is so that way the opposing parties understand exactly who we are and what we do for people. That way they get an idea of not just here's what other blind people are doing, but here's the expectation that will likely be applied to me if this does go to court or if this otherwise becomes a litigative issue.
Chris Danielsen: And the other thing about that is that we don't typically enter into, parts of an agreement may be confidential, but is it fair to say that we try to avoid these confidential things because people talk about the drive-by litigants or the click-by litigants where there are law firms that take a particular area or they take a particular type of business and they just sue everybody in... They just blanket the area with lawsuits. And then they reach a bunch of settlements for money. And we don't do that.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: We don't do that, and we also don't try and pursue those cases that don't have, let's call it cutting edge merit. We really are looking at that impact work and we're looking at exactly what we can do to benefit blind people as much as possible. Finances are not something that doesn't really enter into our calculus a whole lot. We want to make sure we're not losing tons and tons of money, but we're not in it for the money either. So your point about drive-by litigants, we're not really in the business of representing drive-by litigants so much. It's not that people can't come to us if multiple things are going on over time, but we also understand that if you've come and gotten help from us once or twice, that you're also probably developing those advocacy skills and learning to harness those other resources such that probably you're going to be able to take care of that more yourself as time goes on.
Chris Danielsen: Sure. Now, let's say you on behalf of the Federation with the team, have decided that it's a case we need to pursue. What do I need to expect and what do I need to be prepared to do if it is a situation where it's going to go to litigation? Because this is important for people to know.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: If something's going to go to litigation, we know it's going to go to litigation. Then what we're probably going to do is bring in one of our attorneys who works on contract. They have a firm. That firm is going to take you on as a client and the NFB pays the bill, but the firm does the primary representation when it comes to those federal lawsuits. So they're going to get a retainer agreement, they're going to have you sign it in an accessible format, you're going to meet with the attorney who's overseeing the case. You'll probably also meet with me in the process as well. And we'll begin to shepherd you through to let you know in this kind of case, what's the timeline? What are you going to expect from the opposing party, that sort of thing, and we'll be very realistic about what the damages are going to be.
2022, we had a case called Cummings, a Supreme Court case. And after that it was determined that in disability rights cases, typically you do not get emotional distress damages. You are not seeing pain and suffering much after 2022. We'll tell you, are you going to get money out of this or is it going to be attorney's fees, court costs, and what's called injunctive relief or behavioral change on the part of the bad actor. And we can talk about that because it's different in each case, sometimes you'll have some lost opportunity damages or you'll have some state level statutory damages that spring. But most of the time at this point, we're really focused on getting the behavioral change and making sure that your needs are taken care of going forward.
Anil Lewis: It's very helpful. I think that you point out that this is not the moneymaker for the individual as most people think, because I think that that's a motivating factor for many people that want to sue. They're not necessarily seeking to get access to something. They're thinking that it's going to be a big payday. But on the flip side of that I also recognize that people don't understand that when you're suing someone, it takes a lot out of you. I've been part of some litigation against a state agency around employment, and they ran me up and down the road and talked about me in so many ways. It really was a toll on me as an individual. So, a lot of people need to be aware that it's going to require some backbone, some staying power and being able to really put up with the pretty much combative system.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Exactly. And we do warn people retaliation can happen. Yes, it's illegal. However, the opposing party has already demonstrated a disregard for the law. So do be aware of that. Be aware of the pragmatic barriers as well as the psychological barriers. What are the things that you are going to need to be able to handle going through an adversarial system like this? And psychologically advocacy fatigue is real. And I don't think historically, I don't think that's something that got a lot of airtime. These days we're getting better about talking about it, but advocacy fatigue is absolutely a real thing. And it is very, very difficult for the folks who are going through it. And thankfully, we do have a great team here who's happy to help work through all of that, but lawyers can only do so much. And so we like to prepare folks going in so that way they know what they're getting into.
Chris Danielsen: Okay, so you alluded to the fact though, that we receive more applications than cases we can take. So let's take a break and then when we come back after the break, we'll talk about what people can do. You've alluded to some of it already, but what people can do and what we can help them do and provide resources to do when the legal avenue, or at least a litigation avenue through the Federation isn't an option.
Announcer: Make a difference with the National Federation of the Blind's Dream Big, Give 25 Drive. Each year, thousands of Federation members and friends contribute to support blind people. But we still need your help for our programs in 2024 and beyond. When you give 25 dollar or more, between May 16th and July 6th, you are entered into the Dream Big Give 25 Drive drawing. Each 25 dollar contribution is a chance to win. Why dream big? Because blindness doesn't hold you back. You could win prizes like Round-Trip Transportation for two to the 2025 NFB National Convention, hotel accommodations, registration, banquet tickets, or 2,000 dollars cash.
Thanks to our partners you could also win a Monarch, a dynamic tactile device. New this year, friends and family can make donations in your honor, and you'll get extra entries. The drive supports funds like the Kenneth Jernigan Fund and the White Cane Fund. And you can choose one when you donate. To enter, visit nfb.org/give25donate. Call 410 659 9314, extension 2430, or send a check to National Federation of the Blind and mention Give 25 and the fund in the memo. The winner will be announced July 8th 2024. Thank you for your generosity.
Anil Lewis: All right, and we're back. So I'm going to take a little bit of privilege. And before we move to the self-advocacy strategies, Chris was setting us up for, Sanho can you give our listeners just a sampling of some of the current litigation that the Federation is engaging in?
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Oh my goodness. Okay. Let's see. So a few updates just looking at the Social Security administration first, they are rolling out their accessible kiosks. And so those are in the works as we speak. And then we have a couple of family law cases where we are getting blind parents back in touch with their children after the children were, yes, absolutely, after the children were removed or put into guardianships with family members while those blind people needed. And then we're getting training, but they came out of training and they're doing great, and now they're back in touch with their kids. Right now-
Anil Lewis: Awesome. Hold on before you skip past that. I really love this fact. And a lot of people don't recognize, I know President Riccobono, if you want to move him, get to a place where you're telling him that somebody's taking kids away from blind parents. That's really going to get him up and moving. But I think that people need to understand that we're also very responsible in that type of advocacy, because in some instances, if we find that the parent still needs some skills training, then we negotiate on both sides because our goal is to make sure that that child is in a safe, protective home. And if it requires us to set up a way for that blind parent to get training and activities of daily living and become more independent, then that's what we advocate for. So we are all about the holistic rehabilitation of the blind person, and creating real strong safe environments for families. Sorry about that.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: No, no, I appreciate it. And you're absolutely right. In fact, the case that I'm thinking of, the client admitted that the blindness skills initially, right after blindness were not there. And they took the initiative and they made such indescribable progress. And as they say, after nine months at a training center, they could tear a house down to the studs and rebuild it from the ground up if they had to. And they live it, they breathe it. It's just amazing to watch. And that's the evidence that we like to see for court, to be honest. If it ends up going that way, we want to be able to show the judge, here are all these people who can testify to this person's competence and confidence as a blind person.
Anil Lewis: Very nice.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Next I would say we have some employment cases where we had employers who were not making the digital workplace accessible to blind employees. And we've gone ahead and filed federal complaints in those cases. So those folks are now getting more of what they need and we expect that they will be successful. And we have cases where we are handling medical denials where people were refused paperwork being filled out by healthcare providers offices, and they were literally refused actual medical procedures and other diagnostic services. And so we're advocating under Title III and sometimes Title II of the ADA to say, no, no, here your obligations under the law, meet them. And again, we're seeing some pretty good progress there. And then we have a number of cases right now with students, K-12 students in particular who have been facing discrimination in the school system. We're working on those with IEPs and state complaints.
And then we have some university students who similar situation, and I know many of us who've been through the university system can attest, but unfortunately though we had some success getting blind students what they needed at a few universities around the country, what we find time and time again is that unfortunately these administrators then they don't always want to follow through, but we fight the good fight and we continue to have the meetings and it's all coming together. And then finally, the next bucket I think I would touch on would be our blind prisoners cases.
And so for those of you who don't know any inmates or who have never worked with incarcerated people, they very often are getting the worst services imaginable. And because they're in a box, no one knows. And I was shocked by it to be honest with you, but the more I get to know these clients, the more I see they re people and bad things have happened to them, but bad things are continuing to happen to them now that they're blind and we need to go ahead and fight that good fight as well. And so we're doing some post settlement monitoring and we're continuing to work on each of those cases as they come up and things are working out.
Anil Lewis: Sounds like you're pretty busy.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Absolutely.
Chris Danielsen: I do want to harp on that just a little bit because the Federation is not just about the great blind people. Not that these aren't great blind people, but they're in prison typically because they've made mistakes, but they are still human beings. They are blind human beings. They deserve to be able to take advantage of what the correction system does have to offer so that they can be rehabilitated in the criminal justice sense like any other person who is incarcerated. And so it's critically important because it's so easy for the prisons just to say, oh, well, we're not going to deal with your needs. We're not going to make sure that you can access prison work opportunities. We're not going to let you access the library and the educational opportunities that are available. And sometimes it's even more basic than that. But the point is that we take it at every level in order to make sure that these folks are able to get what they can out of the correction system and then rejoin society. And we're looking at them as blind human beings who need to have that opportunity.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Chris, I just want to jump in. I really appreciate you saying that. Thank you. Because I was just on the phone with someone last week who felt that he had absolutely no one because he has been involved in X, Y, Z, had these charges brought, he was convicted, ended up in the system for quite a while, and he started to apologize to me for wasting my time in his mind. And I said, no, no, no. So a few things. First of all, I said to him, I have never looked up what one of our inmate clients has done. Okay, because that is not my business. I'm not interested in that. What I'm interested in, what is a blind person not receiving and what can I do about it? And second of all, you do not owe me an apology. Okay. And that goes for all of our applicants, is you not getting what you need as a blind person is not your fault. Okay And we might talk about how to leverage self-advocacy strategies and opportunities, but that is never your fault that you are not receiving something that you are guaranteed by law.
Chris Danielsen: Absolutely. Absolutely. That's really important.
Anil Lewis: Well said.
Chris Danielsen: Yeah, beautifully said. And one thing you didn't touch on, and maybe we don't have as many active cases right now, but it lets us bleed into the self-advocacy stuff. So it is 2024, and I don't know if people know, but there are these elections happening. One of them is big that's coming up at later in the year.
Anil Lewis: Oh, you mean the election of the National Federation of the Blind president?
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Yeah, that one.
Anil Lewis: In Orlando.
Chris Danielsen: Yeah. Yeah, that is true. That's important.
Anil Lewis: There's a smaller election in November. There's another one in November that's pretty important too. Yeah.
Chris Danielsen: But see, we know that our election will be fully accessible.
Anil Lewis: How about that?
Chris Danielsen: Yeah. See now other elections, we don't necessarily know that. So let's talk a little bit about the legal work we have done and in voting, and then I think this is a perfect opportunity to start talking about in that area. And then we can bleed into other areas of self-advocacy and making sure that you get to exercise your right to a private independent ballot.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Sure. In various states around the country we've done a couple of things. The first is that we have fought for the right for accessible voting, period, whether that be a machine, whether that be electronic. But we have a ton of those initiatives that have been going on for quite some time, many, many years now, and they resolved successfully. Now that we're deep into the digital age, we're also working on a second prong, and that is accessible ballot return in those states, particularly where they already have accessible ballot return for military and overseas voters. For those of you who do not know, military personnel and expats or American citizens who are living overseas very often have the option to return their ballot electronically and as securely as possible. And it works fine for them, but often in those same states, blind people and other disabled people are denied that same opportunity. And we don't understand how that could be.
How is it that you can say it's fine for these able-bodied folks where we really admire their professions or we admire what they're doing so they get some kind of status, but then for us, for these lowly disabled people, no, well, that's not acceptable. And so we continue to beat that drum and fight those battles because we refuse to accept second-class citizenship for our members and our future members. Yeah. And so we do have several of both types of those cases going on right now throughout the country. And as I say, so far so good. They're resolving in our favor.
Chris Danielsen: Exactly. Which is a good thing, because I have to tell you, I happen to live in a state where I can mark a ballot if I choose to vote, not by going to a polling place, but by voting from home, I can mark my ballot accessibly, but then I have to print it, which means I have to find a printer, because I don't have a printer at home because I don't really need to print stuff on paper most of the time. And then I have to deal with all of the logistics of getting that printed ballot to the board of elections, and that introduces opportunities for other people to see my ballot and potentially tamper with my ballot. So it's not an issue that people think about. And some of these advocates who are unfortunately on the other side of the issue, they say, well, electronic ballot return is a security risk.
And all I have to say to them is, look, I am taking a security risk when I don't do electronic ballot return. So I am really glad that we're doing this work. So we're trying to get these systems in place, but we all know too, that sometimes you show up at the polling place and the machine isn't working, or sometime something else goes wrong. So there are things that individual voters can actually do that will help in our advocacy, but will also help them and make sure that their issues are addressed with their jurisdiction. And talk about that a little bit.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Sure. Well, the first thing that I always recommend to people is ideally know your election officials. The best thing that we could do is on off years especially, create those relationships to leverage those relationships. So that way we're not just benefiting one individual polling place or one individual voter, but all disabled voters and even non-disabled voters who might want to use that technology. I will tell you, I know several fully able-bodied people, no disabilities of any kind to their knowledge, and they love our accessible voting machines because it makes things very streamlined, very straightforward. They like the multi-sensory feedback. Well-
Anil Lewis: And it protects your vote.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: That too.
Anil Lewis: These machines keep you from over voting, keep you from under voting. If you're talking about the marked ballots, it keeps you from making straight marks that de-validate your ballot. It's just a better way.
Chris Danielsen: Keeps you from spoiling the ballot, in other words, is what they call it in electionese.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: And so when we cultivate those relationships with our election officials and start maybe our affiliates or our chapters can reach out, create those relationships, we can do the bit of in-service that needs to be done sometimes and make sure that they understand the import, make sure they understand the impact, and then we can go forward. Now, once we actually decide which way we're going to vote, whether it's voting absentee, voting in person, we have a few things. So if we show up and the machine isn't even plugged in and they say, oh, we'll just have someone fill it out with you in print, you can trust us, honest. Well, you get to make that decision. But the law says that they don't get to do that, which is to say they cannot force you to take that accommodation. They might think that they can and they are wrong.
So then they might say, well, can't you bring someone or can't you go to this other polling place where we did plug it in and it is working? Again, that's up to you. But my answer would be no, because we're going to plug it in, we're going to make sure it's working and it's going to work just fine. But maybe you don't have the time for that, or maybe something else is going on and that's perfectly valid.
Anil Lewis: But as we get into it, and you're right, it is perfectly valid and people have the option. But I think as we look at transitioning to talking about self-advocacy, advocacy comes at a personal sacrifice. And I think that in instances like this, and I've heard stories and I'm proud of people who have the ability and the tenacity to do this, to go to those polling places, the people have seen them before. They know they're coming to vote again. They should have done their due diligence to make sure the machine's ready, but it's not. And they will sit there because everybody says, well, let me do it. All right, try all these other types. No, make the machines work. They will sit there until the voting officials get a response to the point where the machine works.
And it's that type of advocacy that's going to create systemic change. If people just continue to make it seem like it's not a big deal, then systemically it will not be a big deal. So it's important as a self-advocate that once we secure these rights, we have to really fight to make sure that we maintain them.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: Exactly. And I'm one of those people, I've always taken as long as it takes and made sure that the machine was hooked up and that my ballot is printed out correctly, et cetera. But that is tough for some folks. I respect that. But yeah, I'm one of the people who's going to sit there. I refuse to let blindness be a reason why I get to be discriminated against. If I can do anything about it, I'm going to do something about it.
Anil Lewis: Sure. And I'm not casting shade on anyone who doesn't have the time wherewithal or whatever circumstances. All I'm saying is I applaud the individuals that do take the time to really put it on the line like that.
Chris Danielsen: And then after you have sat there, and then it is important that you let those election officials that you've gotten to know what happened at your polling place so that they can make sure that it doesn't happen again. And then if it really got ugly and for whatever reason, despite your best efforts, you were not able to vote privately and independently, then you can send a little email to the voting section at the Department of Justice if it gets to that.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: You can, yeah, you can do a few different things. So you can, yes, file a complaint or a charge of discrimination with the Department of Justice. You can contact us, fill out our voter survey or go ahead, give me a call or email me. My extension for everyone again is 2440, or my email, [email protected]. I'm always happy to talk with people about their options. And the other thing is that your chapter and your affiliate can continue that advocacy as a group with the county election board because there's no reason for them to get it wrong twice, none. They need to be doing these trainings and we have the power, we have the leverage to make them do these trainings.
Chris Danielsen: Absolutely.
Anil Lewis: And we have tools online not only just for helping people with voting advocacy, but-
Chris Danielsen: Exactly.
Anil Lewis: ... we have tools online to help college students be their best advocate in the post-secondary environment. So many different tools because again, the overall goal is not for us as an organization to litigate everybody's case. Our overall goal is to create a whole army of individuals who are armed with the information and the strategies and the techniques to go out there and change the world. Because if we can do it with all of us participating, we're that much closer to creating a more accessible world.
Chris Danielsen:That's right. We have, you can help me Sanho remember all of these, but there's a whole webpage of them. There's template letters that we have and there's toolkits for parents of blind students and for blind students themselves and for workplace issues. What am I missing?
Anil Lewis: Most recently, we just launched a non-visual accessibility, self-advocacy toolkit, which is really getting a lot of play in social media. And again, that's going to be huge. The more we empower blind individuals to be that first line of offense to those who have created inaccessible spaces for us, the better we're going to be and the more access we'll have.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: And even just beyond this individual capacity, there's also the group work that we're doing with things like Washington Seminar where we're looking at legislative change as well, is that way we have more sweeping law to protect us because for instance, as many people know, the Americans with Disabilities Act is silent on the issue of internet access. Now, it has thankfully been interpreted to protect our right to internet access in many situations, but we simply do not have a right to the internet in some states, in some circumstances, that is not okay. And so the more that we work on bills like the Websites and Software Applications Accessibility Act, and the more that we work with people like the Department of Justice to get new rules out there, new rules for our regulations, the more we are doing work for not just ourselves as blind people, but for all blind people in this country and elsewhere, because other countries do look to us to see what we're up to as a nation. The more we can be involved both on the individual level and on the national level, the better.
Chris Danielsen: You're so right, and I'm glad you brought this up. It is a systemic thing where the legal cases are just part of what we do. There's also the legislation, there's also the individual advocacy that we do, the relationships we build with our local officials, the work that the chapters and affiliates do. So really important for people to know. Sanho has given his contact information. And there's also a web page, nfb.org/legal that is a portal, if you will, to all of the things that we have talked about. And you can explore that. You can find out about all the legal work we've done. You can read the legal agreements, you can find some of our self-advocacy toolkits. You can do all of that starting on this web page. Find out some of the resources that you can hit before you call us as well. And Sanho mentioned some of them, your state's Protection and Advocacy agency, your legal aid. So all of that is available at nfb.org/legal
Anil Lewis: Sanho, do you have anything to offer our listeners before we bring this particular episode to a close? This has been really helpful information, by the way, and I'm hoping again that people can use this to encourage and inspire more individuals to be self-advocates.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: I would say don't be afraid to reach out and leverage your resources. As I say, we can't take every case. We can't even take most cases for full representation, but there's always a chance we could take your case. And it is almost certain that I would at least be able to provide some counsel, some advice, some guidance to get you pointed in the right direction. And please don't feel like you're wasting my time. I tell people all the time that I spend several hours a day on the phone with folks and emailing back and forth to make sure that as many people have what they need as possible. And that way we're all learning together and growing as we go forward.
Chris Danielsen: And I think it's great that folks have gotten to know you a little bit here on the podcast. You are very easy to talk to. It's been very pleasant talking with you, so nobody should be intimidated by the prospect of calling up Sanho and getting his good advice and counsel and discussing how you're going to move forward.
Anil Lewis: Yes. Just pronounce his name correctly.
Sanho Steele-Louchart: I'll respond to anything. I used to be a mobility specialist before I was an attorney, and I used to tell my students, it's not nacho, it's not this and that, but I'll pretty much respond to anything.
Anil Lewis: Nice, nice. Well, the fact that you are responsive I think is a win. This has been helpful information and thank you for sharing. I hope our listeners have benefited from it. And if you have any questions that you want to offer, any suggestions on other topics for the future, please reach out to us. You can email us at [email protected].
Chris Danielsen: Or you can actually use this ancient device called a telephone.
Anil Lewis: I love it.
Chris Danielsen: And you can dial our main number, 410 659 9314, and then dial 2444.
Anil Lewis: And you can leave a voicemail.
Chris Danielsen: Yes.
Anil Lewis: And if you leave a nice one that's substantive, maybe we can play it on our podcast here.
Chris Danielsen: Yes, exactly. Exactly. There are also social media thingies that you can get in touch with us on, including X and Mastodon, and all those are listed on our web pages. I'm not going to try to go through all the handles and you can email podcast, singular, @nfb.org.
Anil Lewis: We look forward to hearing from you. And remember, until next time, you can live the life you want.
Chris Danielsen: Blindness is not what holds you back.
Outro: We'd love your feedback. Email [email protected] or call 410 659 9314. Extension 2444.