h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hypatia, I've had something comparable in my library, but we've always gotten past it without incident. There is a caretaker of some sort who brings developmentally retarded people (adults with such severely low IQs that they act like like toddlers) to various public places around town. I've seen them at the local swimming pool, as well as at the library where I work. The caretaker will sit one or two of them in a chair while he checks his email on our public computers. While he does that, they often emit groans, or they snort repeatedly. I try not to say or do anything to make them (or the caretaker) feel uncomfortable, because I know it's just for a little while, and because I know they don't know any better.

We also have some special-needs people who are regular patrons, and who use our computers. We treat them like everyone else, but with occasional extra compassion. There but for the grace of God go the rest of us. Maybe on some karmic level there is a benefit for all of us in this. Who really knows? The library is rarely as quiet as some people who prefer, but life in public spaces is unpredictable at best.

Thanks everyone for your input. Caring for a family member with a disability or chronic illness is frustrating, exhausting, and often heartbreaking. I do genuinely sympathize with the family referenced in my original post and with anyone in a similar situation. I also sympathize with adults who have to live with physical limitations.

Pin, I especially want to thank you for your post. Your anger and defensiveness is understandable. Most parents will do anything in their power to protect and nurture their children. Returning to the original post, I am curious where you would draw the line, or if you would, at inconveniencing other people in order to provide your child with a "normal" movie/concert/theatre/story hour/whatever experience? Surely it comes down to making a judgment call, one in which your perception of what is acceptable might differ with that of the next guy.

I've always welcomed children and adults with autisism or any other disability to library events. We do whatever we can to make them comfortable and make whatever accomodations we can to help them enjoy themselves. Most of the time the other people in attendance are fine with it and also make them welcome. But we've also had complaints and angry remarks when things don't go well. So, in a room of 50 kids, who is more important? One who clearly isn't to blame for his situation and deserves to be treated with respect and compassion or the other 49 who are unable to get anything from the program because of the distractions?

Concerning my second point, do I spend whatever portion of my library budget I can muster to accomodate people with disabilities? Yes. I even persuaded the taxpayers in my small, poor town to take on $2 million of debt to make the library handicap accessible. I really am trying to do the right thing.

Having said that, I received a request (closer to a demand) from the mother of a deaf child to provide sign language at all of our children's programs. There is simply no way I can afford to do that. I suppose I could stop buying books in order to pay for it. Or fire an employee. To put things into perspective, it would cost me more to provide an interpreter for this one child than the total amount I spent on programming the last four years combined. If the parents manage to force this somehow, then my only option will be to cancel all programming at the library. Why should this family have the right to demand something I reasonably cannot provide? It has nothing to do with being uncaring or with not recognizing the need and sympathizing with it.

Saying that the government should make social programs a higher priority and find the money is great. But it isn't practical. Libraries are funded locally. I live in a poverty pocket. My annual income for the library is small. I can't always afford to do the right thing.

And this is the point I was trying to make. How do we decide whose needs and wants are the most important? Do we pull funds from line items that benefit everyone to provide for one or two people when doing so would make a drastic change in what services we could offer?

MR, I'm not sure why this mother doesn't adopt some of your techniques. She is definitely angry and frustrated. She's very in your face with it all, like her child's disability is everyone else's fault and she is damn well going to make sure we all recognize her child and his needs. I hate to criticize because I honestly don't know how I would react in the same situation. I don't think I'd take the attitude that I'm suffering, my family is suffering, so I don't give a fig how much we inconvenience the rest of you.

Hi Phred! How goes it? I'm doing fine. Very busy of late and not on site that much. I'll have some breathing space in a week or so. The next time you're in the area, please stop by. I'd like for you and Mrs. Phred to meet my fellow. You don't even have to bring halibut.

Paul's mention of the computer lab brings up another point. We have designed all of our workstations in the library to accomodate wheelchairs. We have all sorts of adaptive devices. Some read to patrons with limited eyesight. We have keyboards specially designed to make typing easier. That sort of thing. There are lots of things available out there if you can find the money for them.

We have our regulars, too, Paul. Most of them are a pleasure to work with. A few are quite difficult. But we do our best. That's all we can do.

No halibut in the RVs freezer right now, but lots of Oregon sockeye salmon, lingcod and rockfish....maybe we'll drop by in a couple of weeks and make you both dinner...I have an excellent recipe for rockfish.

Phred

Here in the UK at least we have the disability descrimination act (DDA), and also a lot of professionals who work in 'disability related' roles, an unfortunately most of these people are incredibably stupid and don't understand the DDA and what it says.
One important part of it, which seems to cause the most trubble with people in highly paid managerial positions, who relaly oughta be clever enough to work it out, is the constant references in the DDA to 'reasonable adjustment', and simular terms...
so with the example of the library above, with a small budget per year to run it, the example of a signle person asking for sign language interpuriters for each of multiple events, wouldn't really be considered as 'reasonable', simularly and an example I know in the UK, a university building, built in the 12 hundreds, protected by preservation orders as its such an old building, its then not considered reasonable to spend multiple millions of pouds to put an accessible lift in which at the same time wouldn't go against the preservation laws regulating building work on a building of such an age

does falling asleep and dreaming quite loudly while being sat in a cinama................... count

Snoring loudly usually results in a gentle nudge to wake up.

Gosho, you're curry story was funny. I have food allergies and know I'm a pain because of it. I try not to be, but it's pretty unavoidable sometimes.

2Legs, here it seems to depend on who you get at ADA whether they use any common sense in enforcing the regulations or not. We have more leeway in old buildings than in new construction, too. But they seem to think all those who fail to comply have the means to do so and are just being selfish and stubborn. Typical myopic bureaucrats. The amount of money the ADA costs the school districts is just amazing. I agree in theory that every child should have equal rights to a quality education. Who could argue with that? But the nuts and bolts of it all is sometimes daunting.

There is one regulation that requires us to read the newspaper to a person who is visually impaired if they request it. No matter that it could take ages and might leave the circulation desk unmanned. Stuff like that. It is all well-intentioned, but it makes things difficult.

Hey, Hypatia - just a suggestion about your deaf child?

Maybe the mother could help you find a volunteer translator? Or one who worked cheap?

I'm thinking of someone I knew - the young woman who taught me violin. Both her parents were deaf, and she worked her way through college by being a translator and note-taker for deaf students.

Students might not break the budget. Or somebody might do it for a volunteer job.

When I was in high school, two of our students were blind, and being 'mainstreamed' into the school system. Out of friendship and interest, several other students learned Braille. One of them became board-certified.

A big payoff from the naughty desire to write notes in class. (Their Braille note-writing was covered by the sound of the blind student taking notes, styluses make a little click.)

A group of us used to take one of the blind girls with us when we went bowling. The day she bowled a strike, the entire bowling alley stood up and cheered.

What I learned was that if 'their' problem became 'our' problem, we got a win/win situation. (And I learned not to run Cindy into lockers, etc.)

I found the same thing when teaching developmentally-disabled adults in music therapy, or giving them guided tours of a small museum. It can be done without confrontation if we look at it differently. Not your rights, or my rights. Just our mutual needs.

We're trying to locate a volunteer but haven't had any luck so far finding someone who is both willing and free at the necessary times. I've even tried to find someone to teach my staff how to sign for a reasonable price and have been unsuccessful there as well.

No easy answers are there? It has to be a question of context and balance on every occasion. My nephew's severely disabled and can be pretty vocal when he's really enjoying something - there are events and places I'd take him too and ones I wouldn't.

I can't add much to what's been said already except maybe to add something about why parents might want to take their disabled youngsters to events that perhaps don't seem appropriate to other people. Watching my sister and b-in-law bring J up and meeting some of his class mates, I've realised how easy it is for children like them to slip into a detached life, half asleep and constantly pacified. J is very responsive to what's going on - only when he's ill does he get that not-here, sedated look about him. Keeping him engaged is a constant effort to find things to stimulate him.

The pay-back is that his appreciation is very expressive and very infectious. When he's having a good time everyone around him with any understanding of him ends up wearing a great big silly grin.

Which maybe brings up another aspect of this? Does understanding the meaning of the sounds help resolve the problem? Are the sounds of enjoyment, serious classical concert and Chekov plays apart, really disruptive? The parent of any child, regardless of ability, disrupting others out of anger or unhappiness ought, I think, to remove that child.

This is UK-centric, but what I'd like from a librarian organising an event J would get something from would be a welcome willingness to make reasonable allowances. Not to provide an interpreter but to make it easy for the family to provide one.

Another possibly useless suggestion, but here goes:

About reading the newspaper to patrons. Does your state get 'drunk driver money''?

In North Carolina, they require a reeducation course for people with DUIs. The money from that is earmarked for grants to community colleges.

Now, I used to work for a community college, and they decided to use the 'drunk driver money' for a reading service for the visually impaired.

They paid me a whole $10 a day to go over to the college radio station (40,000 listeners) and read the newspaper aloud. Oh, and I got the Charlotte Observer for free. Any tiny radio stations in the neighbourhood?

This is a good discussion, though, because you are getting useful feedback from potential patrons.

Waz, I haven't been around the boy at the concert enough to know for sure if he was having a good time or was distressed. I agree that it makes a big difference. I assumed that he was trying to sing along, but I don't know that for sure. I couldn't see his face or his mother's.

I do like the idea of enlisting the families of disabled patrons to help work out solutions. However, the mother of the deaf child is very confrontational and seems unwilling to just sit and calmly chat about the situation. For a partnership like that to work, both sides have to be willing to work together. What I need to do is find a different family with a deaf child and see if they will work with me to find an interpreter.

dmitri, you've made an interesting suggestion. I plan to contact the radio station at the college and see what they say. Thanks.

Glad that was useful, Hypatia. Some college students are looking for ways to enhance their resumes, as well.

I agree - you need to find somebody on the other side of the question with suggestions rather than complaints.

What people need to realize is that the same program that is practical in a large library with adequate resources is often impossible in a small library in a small town. Even things like finding volunteers is difficult here. Our small population base means we have limited numbers of people qualified to perform any particular task. Then subtract those with no interest in helping and those who can't manage the time and it is slim pickings.

Any and all suggestions are welcome, folks.

Oh, Hypatia, I feel as if we are a small library that is getting smaller! I'm the last reference librarian left after the cutbacks.

A bit off topic but its worth it.......................


several months ago the "mother-in-law" made a cock-up in the teeth cleaning department...................used pile cream instead of toothpaste *sniggers* *cough's* this evening she turned up minus a tooth.............. apperently it fell out, all by itself I suggested it wanted some time on it's own............ but the dentist said "its the result of the pile cream"


RJR

Paul, how large is your library district? And how are you funded? In Missouri, most municipal libraries are independent political subdivisions created by a plebiscite. We have a voted tax levy on real estate for operations.

RJR, how on earth did she mistake pile cream for toothpaste? Pile cream must taste awful. Methinks you're pulling my leg.

I'm getting the impression that the USA is somewhat behind matters as regards all this compaired to the UK; But I think there are many aspects of how the US is governed that compound all this...
As to the matter of having someone read a newspaper to a blind/VI person, I guess on an individual basis... that just seems bonkers....
Here in the UK at least we've the national talking newspaper association who produce national newspapers in audio format (not sure if they're producing it in DAISY format now, it used to be cassette but that was a long time ago when I used to get newspapers by this method), they also produce a lot on CD-ROM, mainly magazines that come out monthly.... Also, I think they provide electronic versions; though in the main these can be accessed direct from the newspapers own website...
Also, there tends to be local (either town or county), groups, who do more regional publications, local newspapers etc, again that used to all be on audio cassette, but I'd imagine most has moved over to DAISY now...
Personally I tend to just access the newspapers online and use the screereader: the free open source screenreaders are getting a lot better now all the time, so maybe that could be a method?: Thunder or NVDA spring to mind as two free screenreaders; not only useful for blind/VI but also for Dyslexic individuals who might find it easier than reading text to hear it out: Of course there are specific software packages designed for the Dyslexic, err I should know what they're called my lodger is trained as an instructor in a couple of them... 'Text aloud' springs to mind I think as one....

One thing I've just remembered; Do you know of the American library for the blind and dyslexic? err I think that was what it was called; I had a few very substantial immunology books from them on cassette when I was a student, cooby immunology 5th edition I think Oo or was it called 'American printing ... something ... for the blind and dyslexic?'

me thinks I ain't.........................

There are two or three people here at work who are learning to sign. One of them often does it for one of the films we're showing. Is there a community college or similar near you that might have students who'd want to practice their skills by signing in the library?