Office of Deaf Services October– November 2011 Visit DSCI website: www.deafservices.iowa.gov Questions or Comments? Email us: dhr.dsci@iowa.gov INFORMATION Iowa Department of Human Rights SIGN of the TIMES INFORMATION Good news from Hamilton Relay Service: Hamilton Relay announces that CapTel customer service expanded in providing 24 hour customer services effective September 1, 2011including week- ends. Tips for calling 9-1-1 for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Community If you call 9-1-1, first tell them if “police”, “fire” or “ambulance” – that is the best thing to do. Find out your local police non-emergency num- ber and have someone call there for you. Tell them you want to test 9-1-1. They can make ar- rangements for you to test 9-1-1 and your TTY when the 9-1-1 center is not busy. Many 9-1-1 centers in Iowa only have one per- son working at a time. Together, we can protect our citizens and edu- cate our emergency services! If you need more clarity regarding these issues, please feel free to contact Nancy directly as she would have more detailed information- Nancy Brady Iowa Law Enforcement Academy Box 130 Johnston, IA 50131 Nancy.brady@iowa.gov 515-242-5011 Whenever possible, when you call 9-1-1, use a regular telephone with a regular phone line. The 9-1-1 centers should be able to find you with a landline phone. Cellular, Wireless, Blackberry, do not always provide your location to the 9-1-1 center. Sometimes they give the caller’s locations, but not always. Voice Over Internet Protocol (Voip) is like Sin- gular and Vonnage look like cell phones but they operate over the internet do not ring in at the 9-1-1 center all of the time, either. Many times, wireless phones ring in at the wrong 9-1-1 center, sometime they go to one that is not the closest to you. So make sure that you know where you are when you call. If you call, and you do not know whether any- one is answering you, tap your spacebar to see if you get an answer. If you still don't get an answer, bang on some- thing as loud as you can. And if you can, YELL! DO NOT HANG UP! If it is dangerous to stay in the house or build- ing, get out before you make the call. If the house is on fire, leave and call from some- where else. Safety First! Office of Deaf Services October–November 2011 Visit DSCI website: www.deafservices.iowa.gov Questions or Comments? Email us: dhr.dsci@iowa.gov Iowa Department of Human Rights SIGN of the TIMES Continued INFORMATION Iowa Dept of Public Safety, State Fire Marshal, Submitted by Ray Reynolds By now many of you are seeing articles re- garding fire departments installing special- ized smoke alarms for the deaf and hard of hearing. I am writing to clarify the smoke detector program and avoid confusion. I am not sure how our program took off among the community that services hard of hearing people but we have had a huge interest in these detectors. The smoke detector cam- paign was initially planned to cover the needs of every school age child based on US fire data showing children are the most vulnerable population to die in a fire. Our campaign was designed to have surveys com- pleted by public school districts in order to determine how many children of the 270,000 kids need detectors. The surveys were collected by the school and forwarded to a point of contact that worked for us as an intern. Around the same time, we had a request from Office of Deaf Services to try and ad- dress a need among deaf families. Over 60 families requested these detectors and were turned away because of the lack of funds. My priority has always been to pro- vide detectors for children and more over children that have hearing difficulties. If we received a sponsor to fund detectors for hard of hearing– As you can imagine, it takes a hardwired smoke alarm with visual strobe. That means in- creased cost and finding electricians. We did have a company that purchased units to equip 50 homes with these visual devices. Those 50 detectors went out the door in less than 2-3 weeks and are now in the proc- ess of being installed. I do not anticipate that we will be able to install these devices in any home that wants one because of the time and resource commitments of my staff. Once we get all of the children that are hard of hearing done, we will reassess and see what our next move will be. Because of the demand for these specialized detectors, we are completing a grant to purchase addi- tional strobe detectors. We are hopeful we can move forward. Office of Deaf Services and State Fire Marshal strongly encourage you to continue completing the survey and send the survey to Office of Deaf Services, Once we get additional funding for purchas- ing these detectors, we can coordinate be- tween Office of Deaf Services & State Fire Marshal and then we will start working to get them installed. We will keep you posted. See the application on the next page to fill out. If you need assistance, please call DSCI for clarification. This information, Visual Smoke Detectors for Deaf and Hard of Hearing is posted and available on the Iowa State Fire Marshal’s website: http://www.dps.state.ia.us/fm/main/smoke_detector_project/index.shtml Conventional smoke alarms can’t fully address the needs of people who are deaf or hard of hearing and who can’t rely on the sound of a conventional alarm to alert them to smoke or fire. Today, safety device manufacturers and vendors offer visual smoke alarms that use sound and strobe lights to alert people to fires in the home. These specialized alarms are more expensive than regular smoke alarms. The Office of Deaf Services within the Department of Human Rights has a long term goal to develop a visual smoke alarm distribution pro- gram for deaf and hard of hearing Iowans. In November 2001, 30 participants who were either deaf or hard of hearing or had a family mem- ber who couldn’t hear volunteered and did a needs assessment survey. As a result, the outcome shows that 63% don’t have visual smoke alarms and 17 families had at least two deaf members per household. The Office of Deaf Services encourages families with deaf or hard of hearing children and hearing children of deaf parents to fill out the Smoke Detector Project Survey. According to the Department of Education’s report, “Data on Iowa Students who are Deaf or Hard of Hear- ing,” November, 2008, shows 3320 students in Iowa. It is recommended when filling out the survey to add how many people are deaf or hard of hearing in your home. Status Form for Deaf/Hard of Hearing The Office of Deaf Services and State Fire Marshal are working together on the needs of visual smoke alarms for the families with deaf or hard of hearing members. This voluntary status form will help get the funding for these specialized alarms. This will also help local fire departments follow up with these families and help collect the optional surveys. This is a voluntary form which deaf and hard of hearing community members can send to the local fire department in their community. It is important to let the firefighters know if you move and/or this information changes. Name _______________________________________________________________________ Phone: (check all that apply) Voice___ TTY___ CapTel ___ VP (video phone) ___ Number: ___________________ Address: _________________________ City: ____________________________ State ______________ Zip Code ___________ Number deaf in household: _______ Number hearing in household: ________ Please check if appropriate: ________ Knows sign language ________ Doesn’t know sign language I give permission for firefighters to provide this information to help with installing the visual smoke alarms in our house. Signature:______________________________________ Date: __________________ Please mail form to your local fire department. Notify fire department in the event of moving from this residence. Office of Deaf Services SIGN of the TIMES October—November 2011 ANNOUNCEMENT Visit DSCI website: www.deafservices.iowa.gov Questions or Comments? Email us: dhr.dsci@iowa.gov INFORMATION INFORMATION Central Iowa Center for Independent Living, CICIL Central Iowa Center for Independent Living now has public access video telephone available to Deaf and Hard of Hearing individuals and the public– this telephone is a closed circuit televi- sion system which enables sign language users to converse with other sign language users in a private and confidential manner. The telephone system is called a Project Empower Public Ac- cess Videophone and is available during regu- lar business hours from 8:30 am until 4:00 pm most business days at the Central Iowa Center for Independent Living. No appointment is needed for use of this equipment. They are lo- cated at 655 Walnut Street in downtown Des Moines. Our office is adjacent to the DART Transit area and their Center is accessible to people who have mobility impairments as well. In addition to the public access videophone ser- vice their Center also has a computer lab avail- able for individuals with disabilities to use free of charge during regular business hours. If you have any questions or need information, please contact Frank Strong, at 515-243-1742 SIGN of the TIMES Office of Deaf Services Visit DSCI website: www.deafservices.iowa.gov Questions or Comments? Email us: dhr.dsci@iowa.gov Interested in signing up for E-mail Alerts? Would you like to know when a public health emergency threatens you and others in our area? Polk County Health Department allows you to sign up for email alerts to find out when there’s a public health emergency, such as disease out- breaks, emergency healthcare facilities, or dis- asters with health consequences. In August, we kept subscribers in the loop about emer- gency cooling locations during the warmest July since 1955. Would you like to receive these alerts? Do you have friends, colleagues or family members who also should be getting these alerts? Please for- ward this email to them so they can sign up. We also have email alerts for general public health news. These emails let you know about events, community health priorities (Healthy Polk 2020), health outcomes and other public health- related news. HERE'S HOW TO SIGN UP TO RECEIVE EMAIL ALERTS ABOUT PUBLIC HEALTH NEWS: Go to our website http:// www.polkcountyiowa.gov/health/ and see the gray box that says "Receive email updates about public health emergencies.*NEW!* Receive up- dates about general public health news" Enter your email address and hit "submit." This will take you to a page where you can select which news alerts you would like to receive. John Gannon selected for Hamilton Relay 2011 Deaf community Leader Award for the State of Iowa - John Gannon has been a strong advocate for the Deaf community in Iowa for many years. His enthusiasm is evident through his involvement and interest in a variety of organizations geared towards individuals who are Deaf. He sup- ported the implementation of relay services in Iowa and is active in supporting the Office of Deaf Services in their activities and advocacy efforts. While John has resided in different ar- eas across the State of Iowa he has remained October–November 2011 11/2: 7 PM: The Hammer Theater (New Open- Captioned film), Located Rave Motion Pictures Dav- enport 53 + IMAX, 3601 East 53rd Street, Davenport, IA 11/2: 7PM: The Hammer Theater (New Open- Captioned Film) Located Village Pointe Cinema- Omaha, 304 North 174th Street, Omaha, NE 68118 11/2: 7 PM: The Hammer Theater (New Open- Captioned Film), Located Lincoln Grand Cinema- Lincoln, 1101 P Street, Lincoln, NE 68508 11/4: 4:30pm-6:30 pm: Deaf Coffee Chat, Old Chi- cago Restaurant (inside College Square mall) 6301 University, Cedar Falls, IA 11/15: 2 pm-4 pm: Deaf Coffee Chat Highway 63 Diner, 3030 Marine Ave, Waterloo, IA (Intersection W. Ridgeway & HWY 63) 11/16: 5 pm– 8 pm: Bang Bang Mongolian Grill, 6240 Mills Civic Parkway, West Des Moines IA 11/19: 10 am– 1pm: DSCI Commission Meeting located Altoona Public Library, 700 8th Street SW, Altoona, IA 12/1: 9:30 am–11:30 am: Deaf Coffee Chat Gravy's Diner, 4129 University, Cedar Falls, IA For more details on these events, see our events webpage: http://www.deafservices.iowa.gov/events/index.html Posting to our Calendar If you would like to post your events onto our calendar, please send an email to dhr.dsci@iowa.gov. The deadline for submission for the December issue is November 30, 2011. Send e-mail sub- missions to dhr.dsci@iowa.gov active in the local Deaf clubs and has generously given his time to assume many office and leader- ship roles within a variety of associations, organi- zations and clubs. Being selected for the 2011 Hamilton Relay Deaf Community Leader Award reflects on John’s accomplishments and high- lights the impact he has made in Iowa. John has received a myriad of honors and held several po- sitions throughout the years. Listed below are just examples: . Long-time active member of the Iowa Asso- ciation of the Deaf (IAD) . Recently selected as “Mr. IAD King” in 2011 . Telecommunications Relay Services board member and advocate . President of the Davenport National fraternity Society of the Deaf club, Clinton Hearing and Deaf Awareness club, and the Iowa Senior Citizens of the Deaf Citizen . Supporter and advocate of the Deaf Services Commission of Iowa . Held office in the Clinton Association of the Deaf, Dubuque Association of the Deaf, and the Iowa Association of the Deaf. John has maintained the trust and respect of indi- viduals inside and outside of the Deaf community in Iowa and continues to be a leader and advo- cate. It is an honor to recognize John Gannon for his accomplishments– Congratulations, John! SIGN of the TIMES INFORMATION CALENDAR OF EVENTS CALENDAR OF EVENTS 10/27: 7:00 pm: The Hammer Theater (new Open- Captioned film), located Rave Motion Pictures Dav- enport 53 + IMAX, 3601 East 53rd Street, Davenport IA 10/27: 7:00 PM: The Hammer Theater (New Open- Captioned film), located Cedar Rapids Galaxy 16 Cinema 10/29: 10 am– 5 pm: Iowa Association of the Deaf Board Meeting, West Des Moines Community Center, 217-5th St, West Des Moines, IA (Valley Junction October–November 2011 Happy Fall