Anonymous Dan Schwartz, Editor, The Hearing Blog said...
From our own investgation, your statement of "facts" in the article is demonstrably false:
When TSA found out the NAD conference was coming to Louisville, TSA reached out to NAD and other members of its disability coalition while Transportation Security Officers at SDF received additional training on screening deaf passengers from local experts in the field.
As part of the planning process for HLAA, NAD, ALDA and AGBell national Conventions, one of the contractural responsibilities of the local Convention bureau is to provide training sessions to the hospitality industry and airports, so that incidents such as what is alleged do not occur.
In our communications with the Louisville Convention & Visitor's Bureau, we found they offered ADA Sensitivity training twice on May 9th:
http://www.gotolouisville.com/part...203;index.aspx
Both seminars were heavily attended by Louisville’s hospitality partners. Speakers included: Anita Dowd and Rachel Rodgers, with the Kentucky Commission on the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, as well as Gary Mudd and Roberta Williams, with the American Printing House for the Blind.
Representatives from the Louisville Regional Airport Authority were invited to attend this complimentary seminar and two LRAA staff RSVP’d that they would be there. However, according to LCVB, attendance was not recorded at the event because it was a free training session.
Under the FOIA, please provide us with a list of TSA screeners who attended the May 9th LVCB ADA training sessions. Yo can forward this to me via e-mail at [email protected]
Finally, out of his rational fear of retaliation by the TSA &/or other Federal agencies, the victim, NAD Member "Tea & Theater," removed his entire blog after his incident became widely publicized; and our attempts to rwch him through the Deaf community have been fruitless. However, here is a cached version of his article describing his treatment:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.co...%2F26846647001
Dan Schwartz,
Editor, The Hearing Blog
July 13, 2012 9:59 AM