From: Kelly Pierce 
Subject: one woman's war
  conflict of interest, Mileczarek says, "Geez, I hope not. Everyone on the
  committee has something to do with disabilities."
 
    As for proof his program works, Mileczarek says, "It's not a researchable
  thing . . . besides, Bonnie Peterson is like a John Bircher. Real
  conservative . . . she believes there's only one way to do things and 
hat's
  with a real structured program. . . . The Federation believes some 
ridiculous
  things--like that you can have a totally blind mobility instructor."
 
    Most rehabilitation programs work on a medical model, where goals are set
  and the program is designed to achieve them, he says. "But people don't 
ant
  to be told you're going to be proficient in this when you leave, like it or
  not," says Mileczarek, who describes his program as "more like a
  smorgasbord."
 
    Copies of Peterson's inflammatory letter circulated throughout the 
disabled
  community, bringing calls from more desperate individuals. One, Lisa Mann,
  had been legally blind since birth. She had spent her entire school life at
  WSVH, except for two years as an MPS high school student. Her MPS teacher 
(an
  opponent of the Braille Bill later) decided Mann didn't need Braille.
  Especially, he says, since the attractive black girl was "more interested 
n
  fashion and boys."
 
    Mann could not meet MPS's graduation standards so she returned to WSVH 
nd
  graduated in 1992. DVR then sent her to MATC's VIP program. "They told me 
I'd
  never be able to travel alone," says Mann. When MATC failed to provide the
  skills needed for an independent life, Mann wasn't surprised, she says. "I
  met one girl there who was going through the program for the fifth time."
 
    Next, DVR sent Mann to Northcentral's VIP, then to Western Wisconsin
  Technical College in La Crosse where, using large-type texts, she was 
lowed
  down so much, she says, she couldn't even earn Cs. When a DVR counselor 
old
  Mann about BLIND Inc., she visited the school. But when she said she wanted
  to go there, DVR sent her to Waukesha County Technical College instead.
 
    Peterson enlisted Rep. Leon Young's (D-Milwaukee) office to help Mann get
  copies of her DVR records, and she accompanied Mann when she filed an 
appeal.
  "Before I met Bonnie Peterson," says Mann, "I was ready to give up hope." 
n
  November, 23-year-old Lisa Mann, who had never walked around her Sherman 
Park
  block alone because she didn't believe a blind person could do that, 
rrived
  at BLIND Inc. One week later, she took a bus across Wisconsin and found her
  way to the state Federation's annual meeting--and she did it alone.
 
    Says DVR supervisor Brackey: "Lisa Mann's case is an anomaly." Says the
  DVR's top administrator, Judy Norman Nunnery: "If there was anything wrong 
in
  Lisa Mann's case, it was that we tried too hard to help her." The fact that
  DVR eventually sent Mann to BLIND, Inc. "has nothing to do with Bonnie
  Peterson" says Nunnery. "She uses the tactics of the civil rights and 
women's
  movements. . . . She says blind people were being treated like the slaves. 
As
  an Afro American, that offends me. . . . She doesn't have credibility with
  this office."
 
                                   BLIND ALLEY
 
 
    When DVR moved into new offices in November 1995, the sign on the door to
  the department's Office for the Blind read "Blind Alley." It might have 
een
  "the first case of truth in labeling" on DVR's part, says Peterson. DVR 
chief
  Nunnery laughs off the sign, saying, "It was just one of those silly 
things."
 
    "How out of touch do they have to be not to know that would be 
ffensive?"
  Peterson asks, repeating her frequent call for a separate office overseeing
  all state services for the blind. Federal law provides for as much, and 
any
  states, including Minnesota and Michigan, have them, but disrupting the
  status quo will be difficult.
 
    Pat Brown, director of Badger Association of the Blind, the state
  contingent of the American Council for the Blind, says Peterson is "a role
  model for all people--not just the blind--because of here convictions and
  diligence. She doesn't let obstacles get in her way." But, he adds, "The
  Council doesn't approve of the Federal's methods--it believes you should 
work
  through the system."
 
    But Milwaukee Mayor John Norquist praises Peterson. "Bureaucrats don't 
like
  her," he says, "but she has credibility, absolutely, with my office." Says
  Sen. Darling: "Bonnie Peterson appears to have a hard edge because anger
  gives her energy, but it is the same kind of energy that fueled the civil
  rights movement and the American Revolution. I wish there were more people
  like her."
 
    When the phone rings now in Peterson's office at the South Side bungalow
  she shares with her husband and daughters, Candice, now 16, and 9-year-old
  Lindsay, the answering machine says, "This is the National Federation of 
he
  Blind of Wisconsin, where we're changing what it means to be blind." 
Already,
  Peterson has brought about a revolutionary change, making it impossible for
  people to say "a blind person don't do that." Over and over again, she has
  proved otherwise.
 
    (Reprinted with the permission of Milwaukee Magazine, February 1997.)
---
---------------