(upbeat music) - Will you consider this?

It all started here in the '30s, maybe?

It's October 15th and it's recognized every year.

And Paula Balistreri from the Central Illinois Center for Blind and Visually Impaired is here to tell me all about the National White Cane Safety Day.

Right?

- Right, right.

- You know, between the BVI and all that stuff I think British Virgin Islands, but it's much more important than that.

Hi, welcome!

- Thank you.

- Okay, so let's talk about what happens every year on October 15th.

- Well, October 15th is a special day for the Blind Center that is nationally recognized as National White Cane Safety Day.

Thank you to President Lyndon Johnson, who made that a national day.

So every year we celebrate that day for one particular reason.

And that is that the long white cane, the iconic symbol of anyone who is visually impaired, was actually created right here in Peoria, Illinois.

- And how did that happen?

- As it turned out, there was a blind person who had a news stand in front of what was the Hotel Pere Marquette.

And he would walk to work every day to sell his newspapers and magazines.

And this was way back like in the '20s, something like that.

And then he would walk home.

And one day a friend of his who happened to be a member of the Lions Club noticed he was struggling trying to cross the street.

And if you think about those days, he was not only dodging vehicles, but he was dodging horses and buggies and horses and bicycle people.

And it was just very difficult for him to know when it was safe to cross the street.

- Right.

There were no crosswalk things or no curb cuts or anything like that.

- Well, and he couldn't see.

But even if there were those things, he still couldn't see when it was safe to go.

So his friend thought, "There's gotta be a way."

And took his cane, painted it the white with the red to make it more noticeable and campaigned to have this be a symbol that, "Hey, here's someone who can't see.

You need to give him the right of way or make it safe for him to cross the street."

One thing led to another, he used that cane, it was successful.

The city of Peoria then was the first city in the country to actually pass an ordinance that, you know, required vehicles to give people holding a white cane the right of way.

- Yield, yes.

- So every year we celebrate that.

The original white cane, we actually own that.

We have it on loan at the Peoria Riverfront Museum where it's on display.

And every year we celebrate that day and we use that day one of our major fundraisers.

- Good for you.

Okay, so, but you didn't know that before you became involved with the Blind Center.

- [Paula] No, had no idea.

- And what was this gentleman's name, do you remember that?

- You know, I don't.

I'm sorry.

- You don't?

That's okay, that's okay.

You have a lot of other things you have to think about.

So you have the Blind Center.

And how does it work?

How many people come?

How many meetings are there?

How many get togethers are there?

What all do you do?

- Well, the Blind Center started in 1955 and we're still in our original building.

And it started-- - [Christine] And that's down on Garden Street?

- Yes.

Started as basically a social group for people who were visually impaired, and they would meet in each other's homes or parks.

But they were very uncomfortable because there was no air conditioning in the summer.

And it was like, where can we meet?

They didn't have a place.

As it turned out, someone sold them a piece of property on Garden Street for $1.

So they campaigned and built a building and had that turn into their place.

And we're still there.

So we do a lot of things.

We provide a social outlet, so we have fun events, that sort of thing.

But we also do things that will help people who lose their sight later in life realize that they can still carry on just like they always have, they're just going to do it differently.

And we do that through technology.

We do that through just little training sessions of how to maneuver around your home safely.

We work with caregivers, family members, and the people who are visually impaired.

And lately it's amazing the things that have come about to help people that lose their sight.

- Right, well, when you had your celebration on October 15th, you had a computer there with a large screen.

But it also, tell me how that computer works, 'cause that's some of the technology that you're offering.

- Right, right.

And technology can be high tech and low tech.

You know, low tech could be things like measuring cups shaped a certain way or with audio signals.

But this computer that you're talking about, basically it's a bigger screen, and it's the programs that we put on it that will either make everything bigger so people who have some sight can see it.

And it's not just a matter of size, but it's also contrast.

You know, black and white you can see a little easier than say, yellow on blue.

So it will change that sort of thing.

The lighting makes a difference because lighting will affect, you know, if there's a glare, low light, high light, just depending on what your-- - [Christine] Where the screen is.

- Well, and your condition of your eyes.

There's also programs that you can put on it so that it will turn anything that's in print to audio.

So you can, and if a website is set up appropriately, which most of them are these days, you can go to a website, Google whatever you want to.

And if you have this program on your computer, then it will translate anything that's on that site to audio.

- Isn't that something?

- So you can do anything.

- And you can do that with your phone too.

- Yes, there are apps for your phone.

And that's one of the first things that we will recommend to people.

If they have a smartphone, we have them come in, bring their phone.

We will set their phone up so that they can do anything that you and I can do on our phone without having to see anything.

They can verbally tell it to do things.

You know, call this, call that, you know, check the weather, whatever it is.

- And it will read emails and texts to them too, also.

- Yes, yes.

- That's just incredible.

Just incredible.

- It is amazing.

- Technology left me behind.

(Paula laughing) So how many people are blind or visually impaired in central Illinois?

How many people do you serve?

- Generally, they say between 3% and 5% of the population will experience some sort of vision loss.

And this is an adult population.

It does not count children.

But that's a significant number if you think about our population.

And then, you know, that's maybe 8,000 people just right in our city.

- And how many people then come to the center, and how do they find out about it?

How do you reach out?

How do they, you know, research you when they can't see to look up, you know?

- Well, we often get calls from caregivers.

We get referrals.

Many of the eye doctors around will say, you know, "I'll treat your medical condition, but for the rest of it, here's where you can go."

Our website is interactive so that you can, you know, if you're Googling, it will come up and people can hear it.

- [Christine] All right, give it to us real quick now before I forget.

- It's www.cicbvi.org.

- Okay, alright.

- But because we're unique in the services that we offer and we generally don't charge for anything, we get calls from literally all over the country.

Most of the time, if it's away from our area, I'll point them in some direction where they can get assistance.

But here, you know, people will either find us through Facebook, they'll find us on our website, you know, they'll hear about us, shows like this, word of mouth, lots of different ways that we're working very hard to get the word out because we do offer very unique services.

- So some of your programs and services, you need to get people there, they can't drive.

So therein lies your fundraisers in large part.

- Right, right.

And that's a huge challenge.

One of the things that we do is we do offer a support group for people who have newly lost their vision, or there's been a significant change just as an opportunity for people to get together with people who have been there, done that, walked that path.

And one of the things that one person brought up during one of these meetings and then everyone agreed was one of the biggest challenges and significant events in their vision loss journey was losing their ability to drive.

And this person described the fact that she kept her driver's license in her wallet way beyond the time that she could safely drive.

But she said, "I just felt like I couldn't give it up because I was giving up part of my identity.

You know, I was losing myself as a person."

And it also, because they can't drive, they're constantly asking for help.

And that is hard.

You know, nobody wants to do that.

They wanna be independent.

So what we do is any event or service that we offer, we will provide free transportation to get those people to us.

Or if we're going on a field trip, you know, to make sure that everybody can go.

That's a challenge.

Our rule, sort of unspoken rule is that we'll try to get anybody within a 15 mile radius.

And that doesn't sound like very far, but that literally covers from where we are, from Pekin, Chillicothe, almost to Brimfield, almost to Eureka.

I mean, that's pretty far.

- Very limited, yeah.

- So we only have two vehicles.

- That's your fleet.

- That's our fleet.

And if we're getting people from all of those places, that means that they're sitting in our vehicle sometimes over an hour for what typically would've been a 10 or 15 minute ride.

- 15 or 20 minute, right.

- So that is very difficult.

So we are really working hard right now to add to our fleet so that we can deploy our vehicles in different directions, get people within a reasonable time to our place so that we can do whatever it is that we're gonna do.

It's expensive, you know?

- Well, and so you said that everything is pretty much free.

Now what if someone gets a computer or one of the readers from you?

Do they rent it from you, or everything is offered for nothing or very minimal?

- Nothing is covered by insurance.

So those computers, if they're enhanced the way that we want them to be, or if it's a reader that will do those sorts of things, they can run anywhere from $3,000 to $8,000.

People just can't afford that.

So what we do is we get them and we have a loaner program.

We will loan those out to people who can use them for however long they need them and then they can have them in their home.

We also have a tech room where people can come in, and if they just wanna do one or two little things, they don't really need it in their home all the time, they can come and use ours and do whatever it is that they want to do.

We have brailling services, so we will braille things for people right there.

- You really do a lot.

And you're trying to think of something all the time.

And you're hearing stories from people.

You were mentioning that there was a woman who was losing her sight and then I guess lost her sight.

And her challenge was getting ready every day.

- Well, you know, those of us who are sighted take it for granted.

I mean, everything we do, we look at things.

And even in our conversation we'll say, "Oh, it's right over there," and wave our arm.

But if you can't see, then you don't see that gesture.

You don't see facial expressions, you don't see colors, you know, you don't see those things.

And so it's hard as a sighted person to really have a large amount of empathy for people without consciously thinking about it.

So when people tell their stories, it brings it home.

And the story that you were mentioning, this was a woman who all through her life, she was very mindful of her appearance.

She always went and got her hair done every week and you know, took really good care of herself.

And as she lost her vision, she still went and got her hair done.

But she would go to fix her hair in the morning and she couldn't see herself in the mirror.

Who thinks of that?

You know, when you and I get up, we just go to the mirror and get ready.

We don't think about what would we do if we couldn't see?

You know, we couldn't put our makeup on.

We couldn't fluff our hair.

You know, we couldn't shave if we were a man.

- You couldn't match your clothes.

- Right!

- So, I mean, do you teach that?

That's something very simple.

- And there's ways that we can accommodate that.

And those are the kinds of things that we do teach people.

There are labeling systems that are tactile that people can feel.

Sometimes it's as simple as a safety pin system where you put a safety pin in a label so that you know that that's what that is.

Other things are little tags that have bumps on them that you can feel.

So, you know, one bump might mean that this is blue, two bumps might mean that this is red or you know, whatever it is.

So there are labeling systems.

There are also little handheld devices that you can hold up in front of something and it will read out loud what it is.

That is very important for things like reading the label on a medicine bottle.

We have people that are within our Center family who, when you meet them, it's amazing.

You know, they can't see.

But we have engineers, we have two certified chefs, we have teachers, we have people who work, you know, every day.

All kinds of things.

And they do it with these accommodations that are, when you think about it, are fairly simple.

But until you're in that spot, you just don't even-- - I can't even imagine.

- I know, it's amazing.

- Now you used to do a dinner, a blind dinner or something like that.

And that was difficult enough because we wore masks and we tried to cut the food on our plates and-- - That was our Dinner in the Dark.

And we did that to give people an experience of not being able to see.

And it's another one of those things where the simple act of sitting down to eat a meal, if you can't see, it's, "Okay, where is my food?"

Maybe I'm reaching for something and I don't realize there's a glass of water there and you knock it over.

You don't know where your utensils are, you don't know where the salt and pepper are, those sorts of things.

So the Dinner in the Dark, just like you said, we would put glasses or a mask on and then encourage, you know, invite people-- - Try to proceed.

- Yeah, try to proceed.

But again, there are ways, even serving somebody.

When you serve someone or hand them a glass, like if I were to hand you this, you would reach out your hand to get it.

But then instead of just putting it out there for you, I would like, let you feel it-- - Put it right in my hand.

- In your hand.

And then I would let you set it down so that you would know-- - Exactly where it was.

- Exactly where it was, instead of me.

Or describing what's on the plate.

You know, your potatoes are at six o'clock, your vegetables are at three o'clock, your, you know, meat is at nine o'clock or whatever it is.

So that they get, you know, a sense of where things are on their plate.

- So at home, some people who are totally blind, do they have someone to help them with their meals in that particular situation, or?

- Sometimes, but often they don't.

But they are familiar with their home.

One of the things that we do for somebody who has newly lost their vision is arrange for what they call an orientation and mobility specialist to come into their home.

Just kind of observe, you know, what's there, and then give them tips on how to maneuver.

We don't necessarily say things like, "Oh, you have to rearrange your whole house," because typically you don't.

But it's little things like organizing their pantry.

If you can imagine reaching in because you want to have tomato soup and grilled cheese for lunch, you get your can for tomato soup and you open it up.

- It's kidney beans.

- And you discover that it's, yeah, asparagus, you know, it's like, not gonna work.

So arranging their pantry, those tactile labeling systems.

Reminding people, if they live with someone else, don't leave a cabinet door open.

You know, because you can't see it.

Don't leave your shoes in the middle of the floor, cords, different things around that somebody could trip over because they can't see them.

Those sorts of things so that their house is safe.

But we do have a lot of people who are 100% on their own in their home.

They prepare their own meals.

They have, again, the tactile labeling on their stoves so they know where the temperatures are so that they can cook.

There are things that you can put in either pots and pans or say a cup like this.

It's just a little thing that kind of hooks over and it will tell you when it's full, will tell you if it's hot so that you don't have to stick your finger in your cup when you're pouring a cup of coffee.

You know, those sorts of things.

And it's a learning process, takes a while to get used to it.

- And the people who go into the homes, are they on staff or are those some of your volunteers?

- We typically don't provide in-home services.

So some people do have a professional caregiver.

More often it's family members or friends.

- Oh, I was talking about the people who come in and assess.

- Oh, that is a professional, it's not us.

We have a list, you know, of resources that we will do a referral to.

So they come in.

- All right, so you might not get another piece of property for a dollar, (Paula laughing) but do you need to grow where you are now?

Or would you like to grow even bigger someplace else?

Or what are the hopes and dreams?

- You know, we really would like to be someplace where we are more visible just because people don't know about us.

But if they can see our building or see our signs, they might think, "Oh, maybe that's a place where I can get help."

So that would be nice.

It is difficult because we're not really centrally located right now.

But it's a dream, you know?

Who knows?

- We all have dreams.

What's been the most interesting thing that you have experienced in taking this position?

How many years now?

- It's been almost six.

Gosh, I would have to say it's the personal stories.

And the fact that we do have people from all walks of life.

You know, we have people geographically from all over, but we have people whose life experiences have all been different.

We have a person whose career was as a heavy equipment operator.

And this woman, so this woman in a male-dominated field was so proud of what she did.

And she operated those gigantic machines.

- Tractors, the big scoops.

- Oh, huge, huge.

Obviously she can't do that anymore because of vision loss.

But hearing her experiences in her career, that's been very interesting.

We have another person who, the very first time that he came to one of our social events, (laughing) he says, "You know, I'd really like to find a wife."

And it's like, well, we're really not a matchmaking service.

(laughing) So I always love that story.

But just, we have families that come.

When we do a social event, we do encourage friends, family, caregivers to join in.

It's fun to do our field trips.

We have gone to the zoo, we have gone to plays.

Which you would think, if you're blind, how would you enjoy a play?

- It wouldn't work, right.

- But there are ways.

We go to restaurants.

We've come to the museum, you know-- - So how do you see a play?

(Paula laughing) Well, they obviously, their sense of hearing is generally increased, isn't it?

So then they can hear what's going on, but.

- Well, we do rely on dialogue.

But we have this little device that everybody can wear a little earpiece, and then one person, and often that's me, I have a microphone.

And the example I like to use is the play "Harvey", if you're familiar with that, with the gigantic rabbit-- - The six foot rabbit.

- That only one person can see.

So you get the general idea of what's going on.

But there is a point in that play where the rabbit walks on stage and nobody says anything.

But the entire audience, you know, starts laughing.

- [Christine] Yes, right.

- Our blind people are like, "Okay, what's so funny?"

- What's going on, right.

- And so I in my microphone say, "Okay, a six foot pink rabbit just walked on the stage," and then they laugh.

So they might be a beat behind, you know, in the laugh.

But literally I am providing a verbal description of what's going on if there's no dialogue.

And people love to go to the plays.

We go to sporting events.

And we do rely on a play by play a lot.

But you still get that atmosphere, you know, of being in the crowd, of hearing, you know, a bat hit a ball, that sort of thing.

So-- - Or the crowd going crazy if it's a three point shot or something.

- Yeah, yeah, exactly.

And so that's really our mission is to have a full life just like you did before, with the accommodations that go along with not being able to see.

And I will point out that not everyone that we serve is 100% blind.

You know, many of them are, but some of them have some vision.

So that means that there's different levels of how you're helping-- - A little bit of a balance too in your groups and things like that.

Well, what do you look forward to most in the next year?

- In the next year, more services.

Our training sessions have just exploded.

You know, and we do provide everything as simple as white cane training.

That iconic white cane, which is very simple, we do train people how to use it.

They are measured to fit a person.

And that is the first step, say, if someone wants to get a guide dog, they have to have white cane training.

So we provide that basic white cane training.

But interestingly, white canes have also evolved.

And now there are white canes available that have a GPS system so that if you, and we have people who are working who travel for their work, they often will borrow one of those canes.

They cost $600 so most people can't buy them.

But we will loan them out.

They will take them along.

They can talk into their phone and say, "Where is the nearest Starbucks?"

Or, "How do I get to such and such an address?"

And that GPS will literally guide them step by step, all while being like a regular cane to understand, you know, obstacles in their path, you know, curbs, stairs, change in texture of the floor, whatever.

So I think that's pretty exciting.

- That's awesome.

- They are working on the GPS-equipped cane version two that, if you can imagine, you're walking down the street with your cane.

And yes, you can tell if there's a crack in the sidewalk, but what you can't tell is if there's a branch hanging in front of your face.

- Okay, so they're working on trying to-- - So they're working on one that will have a sensor somehow on it so that it will detect obstacles here instead of on the floor.

- Wow.

Well, thank you.

You just lit another light bulb in my brain.

(Paula laughing) And again, you're online.

So if you need to find out more about the Central Illinois Center for Blind and Visually Impaired, did a lot better the second time around, get online and find 'em out, give 'em a call.

Thanks, Paula, for being here and thanks for joining us.

Be well.

(upbeat music) (music continues) (music continues) (music continues) (music continues)