October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month and I'm going to honor it with a "toolkit" for employers based on a compilation of a variety of information. I've been waiting to work on the vocational aspect of disability. Waiting for what? No longer. My new motto is "Just Do It." Something will work out and lead to referral$. Part 1)Introduction & Working statistics; Part 2)What ADA means to employers; Part 3)Communicating with People who have Disabilities; Part 4)Examples of common reasonable accommodations; Part 5) How my program "Windows Shopping" can help.

I have my speech organized for next Monday at the Lancaster Library. I hope that people attend, I'm going to the Lancaster Nursing School with flyers. I think it would be really appropriate for those students to attend and do my "Working on Wheels" program. I want to meet some of the staff from the school, this past summer I contacted them but they were all on vacation. I'm still trying to get my therapeutic respite program out there. I expect to meet many people on Tuesday at the rally in Harrisburg. I will report the reaction to people in the area who did not attend. I'm sure I'll learn a lot from that and meet a lot of good people.

I attended a meeting of the Autism Society, on budget cuts and the future of services. No matter how bad it for people who have physical disabilities, it's much worse for those who have autism. The people who make the big decisions do not have a clue what it's like to care for a child this disability. Nor do they see the ramifications of these horrible decisions. The end result will be costing the taxpayers so much more than if they let things alone and just continued to implement the laws such as Act 62. This is the Autism Insurance Act which deals with payment of services. Really unfair!

"Helping someone else helps oneself." I've said that and read that but now it's coming truer than ever. I'm filling a resource table for my temple's Special Education Forum. I've been contacting and meeting with a number of local agencies requesting brochures about their programs. In return I've discovered an autism resource center and met 3 different people who were thrilled to hear about my therepeutic respite program and they insisted that people have asked for this type of service. I can't wait to pursue this further.