Posted on 08/02/2012 11:32:05 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
The local Girl Scouts council paid for a sign-language interpreter to attend Megan's Girl Scout meetings, a camping trip and other outings.
But a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday on the 12-year-old's behalf alleged that the Girl Scouts abruptly disbanded Megan's Schaumburg troop early this year in retaliation for her mother's efforts to keep the 100-year-old organization paying for the interpreter.
....Megan, who has been deaf since birth, joined the Girl Scouts in kindergarten, her mother said. At the time, her mother requested that an interpreter be present at Scouting activities, and the Girl Scouts agreed to that, she said.
But in the fall of 2011, the Girl Scouts of Greater Chicago and Northwest Indiana told Runnion that the "council does not pay for these services," the lawsuit alleged. Runnion made another request in October for her daughter to have an interpreter for a rock climbing event the next month.
But the local council complied only after Equip for Equality, a Chicago-based advocacy group for people with physical or mental disabilities, and the National Association for the Deaf sent a letter requesting an interpreter for the event, according to the lawsuit.
....Runnion said she later learned from the Girl Scouts that the group would pay only a maximum of $50 a month for support services for girls with special needs. Megan's family would have to pick up the added expense.
"People aren't supposed to pay for their accommodations," said Barry Taylor, legal director for Equip for Equality and one of the lawyers representing the Runnion family.
....But Runnion said her family of six relies on her husband's income as an inventory purchaser and can't afford the expense of an interpreter for her daughter....
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
She’s been in the scouts 6 or 7 years, and none of the other girls in the troop liked her enough to learn how to sign? Says something about her, it seems.
On the other hand, the Girl Scouts are a left wing, pro-abortion organization, and I think we can all enjoy it when liberals start fighting about who is most entitled.
My sons high school has a large deaf group of students as it is one of the 4 schools in the district that provide for deaf students.
So, there are a few deaf boys on the football team.
Every morning a fleet of buses arrive with the deaf students to attend class - at the end of school the buses take them back I assume to a stop or set of stops as they come from other school districts.
So, with football practice keeping them after class, at the end of practice, a fleet of taxi’s are there to give those players a ride home all paid for by us.
BTW, those without their own cars have to have their parents come and get them. No taxi’s for you!
“People aren’t supposed to pay for their accommodations,”
Really? That’s good to hear. Now I know I can “dine and dash” legally.
My deaf cousin actually got WORSE at reading lips while spending 4 years at Gallaudet. Her friends were absolutely horrible at it and could only sign. My cousin said the community was so insular that it was just a bunch of deaf people signing to each other with not much attempt to integrate with the hearing world.
More liberal whining. It doesn’t surprise me at all they expect free child care, and that is what this amounts to. The Girl Scouts should pay for their liberal largess.
My Eagle Scout son had special needs from the time he was 13. Even before this my husband and I took care of his needs ourselves. One of us attended every meeting, every camping trip and summer camp from the time he was a cub scout.
PATHETIC! This “mother” (more like a gold-digging moron!) should have gotten her behind out there and translated for HER daughter! If she cared so much she should have been there for her child! Instead, sue, sue, sue, and make other people pay!
Then you get your butt to the events and act as the interpreter. Girls Scouts (the girls, not the organization) are about providing service, not demanding it. The leaders and assistants are volunteers, not your paid servants.
No one made her create a family of 4 kids either.
Don’t forget the lesbian couple who conceived several children trying to become pregnant with a deaf daughter (rather than adopting one).
I think to conspire to create a disabled child is child abuse. Munchausen syndrome. The two women were deaf, if I recall. PBS did a documentary on them.
Do they have to make use of a flash system to alert the deaf players when the ref. blows the whistle?
Don’t tar us all with the same brush.
Easy enough to tell when the whistle’s been blown.
Do you go to the Iowa School? Do you feel “entitled”? If not then this does NOT apply to you.
Public school educated. :) Only accommodation I ever received was not having to listen to tapes in French class.
I have not see that - of the players none are totally deaf either - range from 20% to 70%. All have hearing aids and the team has a translator on the field and at every practice but they never flash signs on the field I have noticed just if the coach wants to talk to them on the sideline do they get involved.
Family of six, one income? I'm starting to see where the problem comes in here.
This mother could find a way to accommodate her daughter if even if it took becoming a den mother herself.
Hey, I’m Deaf so don’t assume that we are all the same. That was an ignorant comment that you just made.
That's how the Boy Scouts escaped having to admit homosexuals, they're not a "public accommodation." It's anyone's guess how the quirky courts will rule on something like this, however. The ADA has seen incredible expansion and twisting under judicial rule since Bush41 signed it into law.
The phrase “by in large” doesn’t mean everyone. It means for the most part or generally.
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