Deaf and Philosophy

Press Conference To Be Held Monday, May 14, at 1 p.m. at Advocacy,
Inc., 7800 Shoal Creek Boulevard, Austin, Texas 78757.                                  

TEXAS LAWYERS REACH OUT TO THE DEAF COMMUNITY

Fund Will Help Lawyers to Pay for Interpreters to Assist Deaf Clients

Austin, Texas  — Advocacy, Inc., a non-profit disability law
organization serving people with disabilities in Texas, announced today the
creation of the Sign Up Fund – a sign language interpreter fund that will
assist Texas lawyers in understanding and accommodating the legal needs
of the deaf.  The Disability Issues Committee of the State Bar of
Texas, which will administer the fund, is to receive twenty thousand dollars
in a start-up grant from the Texas Bar Foundation, which awards grants
twice annually in an effort to improve legal services to under-served
populations in Texas.  The Sign Up Fund will help lawyers in Texas pay
for sign language interpreters in order to assist deaf clients and
ensure compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).   

The ADA, which covers places of public accommodations including law
offices, requires a lawyer to accept clients regardless of disability and
provide the requisite “auxiliary aids,” including sign language
interpreter services, necessary to ensure effective communication where
doing so would not create an “undue burden” on the law office.  Deaf
clients often need sign language interpreters to understand their lawyers: 
thirty percent of the deaf population leaves school functionally
illiterate – i.e., they read at a third grade level or below – making
written communication difficult or ineffective.  And, contrary to the
widespread myth about the utility of speech-reading for the deaf, no more
than twenty to thirty percent of spoken English is visible on the lips,
and even the most talented deaf speech-readers routinely experience
miscommunication.  “A common complaint in the deaf community is the
inability to find an attorney who not only understands the requirements of
the ADA, but is also willing to comply with it,” says Faye Kuo, the Deaf
Rights Specialist at Advocacy, Inc.  “This fund will help lawyers
understand the language needs of the deaf client and help the deaf client
get needed legal assistance.”

Similar efforts in several midwestern states and in one New York
community have attempted to address these issues with encouraging results. 
However, the State Bar of Texas is the first state bar to tackle the
problem systemically by setting up a fund for interpreter dollars. “We
are pleased that the Texas Bar Foundation has prioritized these access
issues in Texas and has supported a means to share the financial
burden,” said Mitchell Katine, Chair of the Disability Issues Committee. 
“We hope that our work on this fund will be expanded to meet the needs
of all deaf clients in Texas and create a template for use in other
states.” 

Under the terms of the grant, lawyers at Advocacy, Inc., a  non-profit
legal services organization with experience representing deaf clients,
will provide state-wide training to bar associations about the Sign Up
Fund and about ADA compliance.  “We are very excited to have this
opportunity to educate Texas lawyers about both ADA compliance and about
the needs of the deaf community in Texas,” said Lucy Wood, a lawyer
with Advocacy, Inc. who focuses on representing deaf individuals in ADA
actions.  “This money will provide many deaf people, many of whom have
had no prior access to legal services or who have not understood their
lawyers in the past, with the opportunity to access needed legal
services.”  

The State Bar of Texas created the Texas Bar Foundation as the
charitable arm of the lawyers of Texas in 1965. The Foundation is the largest
bar foundation of its kind in the nation, and it is renowned for its
ongoing effort to aid the public through its charitable grant making to
justice-related causes.   To date, more than $9 million in grants have
been given by the Foundation to benefit the people of Texas.  These
grants have been awarded for projects and programs that provide legal
services for the needy, education to the public, and improvements within the
legal profession and the administration of justice.

The Texas Bar Foundation is comprised of more than 7,000 Fellows
representing the top one-third of one percent of the State Bar of Texas
membership. Election as a Fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation is a mark of
distinction recognizing excellence in service to the legal profession.