Michigan's Assistive Technology Program

Assistive Technology Connections
Vol. 6, No 5, May 2005

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In This Issue: AT and Housing.

• Calendar
• Michigan Affordable Housing Conference
• MDRC Announces AT and Housing Grants
• Resources
• Announcements
• Cookie Gant Leadership Development Fund
• GREEN Update
• Subscription Information

Calendar:

• May 4, 3pm. Webcast.
  Best Practices for the Employment of People with Disabilities: Learn from the EEOC Report. For more information visit http://www.ilru.org/html/training/webcasts/calendar.html.
• May 9-11. George Washington University in Washington, DC.
  National Training Conference for Deaf and Hard of Hearing. The conference will address Telecommunications Access, Speech Recognition Captioning, Remote CART, Federal Relay, CAP as a resource, and other hearing assistive technology. For more information, go to: http://www.dhhig.org/ntc/2005/index.htm.
• May 11, 3pm. Webcast.
  U.S. Department of Justice & Regulations Regarding the Revised ADA Accessibility Guidelines. For more information visit http://www.ilru.org/html/training/webcasts/calendar.html.
• May 15-18. Disney's Coronado Springs Resort, Orlando, FL.
  21st National Home and Community Based Services Waiver Conference. Convened by the National Association of State Units on Aging. There is a pre-conference Intensive on Using Assistive Technology in Home and Community Based Services. View the full agenda at http://www.nasua.org/waiverconference.
• May 16-18. Lansing Center, Lansing, MI.
  2005 Michigan Conference on Affordable Housing. For more information, see article below or visit: http://www.housingconference.org.
• May 18, 3pm. Webcast.
  IDEA 2004. For more information visit http://www.ilru.org/html/training/webcasts/calendar.html.
• June 8-10. Park Place Hotel - Traverse City.
  MARO Employment & Training Annual Spring Leadership Conference. For more information, call (517) 484-5588 or visit http://www.maro.org/Springcon.html.
• June 16-19, 2005. Toronto, Canada.
  Festival of International Conferences on Disability, Aging and Technology. For complete details, go to http://www.ficdat.ca.
• June 23-24, 2005. Portsmouth, NH.
  Universal Design for Community and Systems Change - A two-day institute to present and explore innovative approaches to building inclusive communities and creating sustainable systems change to support all citizens, including older adults and individuals with disabilities, to live full lives in the community. Complete conference details and registration can be found at www.realchoicenh.org and www.iod.unh.edu.
• July 5-7, 2003. Las Vegas Riviera Hotel and Casino.
  Technology that Works in the Real World Conference on high- and low-tech tools for persons who are blind or visually impaired. For more information, contact Mr. B.T. Kimbrough at (662) 325-7824 or e-mail BKimbrough@colled.msstate.edu.

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Michigan Affordable Housing Conference.

This year's Michigan Conference on Affordable Housing has disability issues woven throughout the event. In addition to learning from several beginning and in-depth sessions on housing resources and programs, workshops include Senior Housing Management: Supporting Successful Aging in Place, and Access is More than a Ramp: Accommodating People with Disabilities at Your Shelter.

In addition, the MACIL Housing Group is hosting an exhibitor booth again this year on Universal Design and Visitability. We are excited that the Tuesday Awards Luncheon from 11:30am-1pm will include the first Building Inclusive Communities Award presented by Michigan Disability Rights Coalition.

For more information or to register, visit www.housingconference.org.

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MDRC announces AT and Housing grants.

Disability Advocates of Kent County (DAKC):

The mission of ZeroStep is to be a one stop resource that provides Universal Design assessment, consultation and education to create homes that are designed and equipped for a lifetime. While ZeroStep as a whole has many outcomes, the outcomes intended for the MDRC AT and Housing grant are: (1) 50 builders/architects/designers will demonstrate knowledge of Universal Design from a disability/independent living (IL) perspective and home-based AT, and (2) 100 additional housing units are constructed incorporating the minimal level of Universal Design.

For more information, contact Judith Williams at (616) 949-1100 x249 or Judith.w@disabilityadvocates.us.

The Disability Network (TDN):

The Housing Leadership for Action group will collaborate with MACIL (Michigan Association of Centers for Independent Living) to create a broad coalition of partners to identify and perform visitability systems advocacy both locally and statewide that maximize the Visitability Advocacy Toolkit. Several local accessible and affordable housing initiates will compliment these activities.

For more information, contact Sue Hart at (810) 742-1800 or sueh88@aol.com.

Disability Resource Center (DRC):

This MDRC AT and Housing grant will fund the formation of a Housing Advocacy Team. This new Housing Accessibility Team (HAT), made up of a wide range of consumers and stakeholders including builders, will educate and influence others on incorporating the principles of inclusive home design and universal design to augment DRC's work on building support for the Inclusive Home Design Act in Michigan.

For more information, contact Paul Ecklund at (269) 345-1516 x62 or pecklund@drccil.org.

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Resources

• For additional resources on housing, visit http://www.copower.org/At/visitable.htm.
• Rep. Lorence Wenke (R-Richland), with co-sponsorship from Rep. Fred Miller (D-Mount Clemens) introduced the Inclusive Home Design Act. Currently in the Local Government and Urban Policy Committee, the bill would require that 1- and 2-family homes built with funds from MSHDA have at least one no-step entry and an accessible path from the street or sidewalk to a bathroom. The bill has won the support of the MACIL Housing Work Group, the Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA), and the legislative committee of the Michigan Home Builders Association (MHBA). For more information, go to: http://www.michigan.gov/cis/0,1607,7-154-10573_11549-110881--,00.html.
• The Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program is administered by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) within the U.S. Department of Treasury. It Can be used to increase housing options for people with disabilities. For More information, go to: http://www.c-c-d.org/od-April05.htm.
• Habitat for Humanity national organization supports visitability. From their website, http://www.habitat.org/how/whatlike.html, "HFHI's board of directors has endorsed the concept that all Habitat houses should incorporate basic accessible design features, such as a zero-step entrance and wide passage doors and hallways." For information on how to join with Habitat and former President Jimmy Carter in Michigan housing projects, go to: http://www.habitat.org/jcwp/2005/.
• Proposed changes at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) could severely affect housing options for people with disabilities. For more information, go to: http://www.tacinc.org/index/viewPage.cfm?pageId=151.
• Funding options for accessible housing - a good summary can be found at: http://chance.unh.edu/jayp.html.
• Advocates Guide to more than 60 housing-related programs, proposals and issues. Go to: http://www.nlihc.org/advocates/index.htm.

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Announcements

• The Michigan ADA Steering Committee is seeking host sites for monthly 90-minute teleconferences on a monthly basis. They will pay the registration fee if your site is accessible, has a conference phone, the ability to download and disseminate training materials specific to the call, and/or computer equipped with software to support a captioned webcast. Sites must agree to market the teleconferences in their local community. To view the schedule, go to: http://www.adagreatlakes.org/PnServices/AudioConferencing/schedule.shtml#200. For more information, contact Collene Dabish, Coordinator: Phone/TTY: 1-800-414-3956 or email cdabish@mpas.org.
• The Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Recreational Technologies and Exercise Physiology in Disability (RERC-RecTech) offers an Internet- accessible database of recreational and exercise technology. For more information, go to http://www.rercrectech.org. To submit information, email bfay@uic.edu.
• United Spinal Association announces a new website dedicated to reversing Medicare's in-the-home policy. To find out more, go to www.Rightwheelchair.org or contact Kim Ruff-Wilbert at (202) 331-1002 or email LegislativeAlerts@unitedspinal.org .
• Extended Deadline for State of the Science on Workplace Accommodations The Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center (RERC) is announcing a Call for Papers for its 2005 State of the Science Conference, scheduled for September 15-16, 2005 in Atlanta, GA. The conference will address costs and gaps of providing effective and reasonable accommodations; how products with universal design features are affecting the need for AT; safety issues in the workplace for people with disabilities; telework accommodations; and /or the AT needs of aging workers. For more information, go to http://www.workrerc.org/sos. For information on the AT resources at work, go to http://www.workrerc.org or contact Carrie Bruce, M.A., CCC-SLP, ATP at the Center for Assistive Technology and Environmental Access (CATEA), Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta: 1-800-726-9119.

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Cookie Gant Leadership Development Fund Application Online:

Cookie Gant was a disability activist, a performance artist, a powerful raiser of consciousness, a relentless supporter of diversity in every part of life, and a loyal and perceptive friend. Her passing was an irreplaceable loss in all of our lives. One of Cookie's goals was to help other disability activists experience conferences and other leadership development opportunities that would make them more effective in the movement.

Michigan Disability Rights Coalition has created a scholarship fund in memory of Cookie to achieve her goal. For more information including the application, see http://www.copower.org/mdrc/cookiesfund.htm .

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GREEN Update:

The Grass Roots Education and Empowerment Network (GREEN) provides funding, mentoring training and other support available to local groups of people with disabilities and advocates to increase access to Assistive Technology (AT). GREEN is supporting grassroots projects all over Michigan! For project ideas, go to http://www.copower.org/At/green/updates.htm.

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List Information:

A service of Michigan Disability Rights Coalition, A.T. Project. Funding is by the Assistive Technology Act received through Michigan Rehabilitation Services.

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