Category Archives: Non profit

Will UN International Day of Persons with Disabilities mean anything on PEI

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PEI celebrates the day with plagiarism, pontificating and prevarication

Minister of Community Services, Seniors and Labour Janice Sherry, press release to follow

The world celebrates UN International Day of Persons with Disabilities. On Prince Edward Island, we can look forward to political hot air.

The appropriate minister will rise in the Legislature to acknowledge her love for and empathy with the situation of Islanders living with disabilities. Those speeches are fulsome, with profound words that puff up those who listen.  In reality, they are hollow with pontificating and prevarication.  Continue reading →

Charities need a new business model

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Dialing for dollars is more of a nuisance than a charitable act

Nalda Wheeler says her fundraisers are having more people hang up on them. (image CBC)

Recent stories from the Canada Revenue Agency that fundraisers are not leaving much for the charity have the public sitting on their wallets.

CBC reported some charities are down 30% or more in their annual fund raising drives. Fund raising report hurts P.E.I. charity

No wonder people don’t want to give. The truth is some charities, even with stringent government controls, are lining their pockets and doing little charitable work in the community.

When we followed up on the original story we found renowned charities like the QEII Health Sciences in Halifax convinced Maritimers to donate $23.5 million but only 8% or $2 million was used for the hospital.  Charities raising money for fundraisers not public good.

On PEI we watched for years as celebrity fund raisers like Rick Hansen breeze unto town, dazzle the politicians and leave with a big cheque. It’s a scam that plays on people’s generosity and charity.  PEI disabled second place to Rick Hansen

The public are tired of a) being called at supper time and b) getting ripped off in the name of charity.  That’s why we have do-not-call laws to protect the public. Continue reading →

Disabled now an environmental hazard

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DARfP of the week – “There’s always the struggle between preserving the environment and making it accessible” Marcia Carroll to CBC

Marcia Carroll - DARfP of the week on the eternal struggle between the disabled and the environment

DARfP is our acronym for dumb ass replies from politicians or other public officials.

People with disabilities have been blamed for lots of silly things – being possessed by demons, taking the best parking spots, costing too much for building renovations.

We are now in a struggle – no we have always been in a struggle with the environment according to Marcia Carroll CEO if PEI’s Council of People with Disabilities.

I never saw myself as an enemy of the environment until now. Something else to worry about if I paid any attention to the feckless leader of PEI’s official disability organization.
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Parents call PEI autism strategy a sham

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Minister Currie pulls the wool over public’s eyes with phony “strategy” without input from the people who matter, parents and people with autism

Yesterday PEI Education Minister Doug Currie announced his long awaited strategy on supports and treatment for children with autism. Recommendations Toward A Prince Edward Island Autism Action Plan: Another Piece of the Puzzle

The 86 page report has a long title but is short on substance. It was immediately denounced by parents, politicians and observers.  These are the people who toil away year in year out with little relief while the government delays.
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PEI’s Currie makes autism announcement

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Short notice and no press release which is typical disability abuse on PEI

Doug Currie promising reforms in 2007 but nothing has changed

“Minister Doug Currie will release Provincial Autism Strategy. Staff and individuals from the Autism Action Group will be on hand to answer questions about the strategy. The public is welcome to attend :) Today @ 1:30 pm pm at the Shaw Building (south) 95-105 Rochford Street, Ch’Town, PEI” (From Autism Society Prince Edward Island)

“Short notice! Gov’t likes it that way!” says one Facebook comment.

This is typical government procedure to bury all disability issues. An important issue – autism – gets an announcement held almost secretly.

Despite promising reforms prior to the election in 2007, the Ghiz government has made little if any progress in services to people living with disabilities.

Less than 5% of the disability community qualifies for benefits. Seniors are still excluding from receiving assistance like wheelchairs. Many people with disabilities live far below the poverty line, many of them are women.  Continue reading →

Disability in-Action Council insults disability community

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Liberal Government propaganda gets swift response from Guardian readers

Minister Janice Sherry "should be ashamed of herself"

The Charlottetown Guardian reprint of Liberal Government press release – P.E.I. Disability Action Council identifies 14 areas of priority was condemned by their readers.

Readers called Carroll’s statements and the press release an insult, hot air, shameful, BS, a waste of money, bordering on abuse, and cynical. A reader thought Minister Janice Sherry “should be ashamed of herself.”

“I feel the areas that the council have chosen to focus on over the next year, which are aimed at improving the disability supports and services around housing, employment, training and leadership, align well with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities,” said Marcia Carroll, chair of the Disability Action Council and CEO of the PEI Council of the Disabled.

Ms Carroll is in her usual form with plenty of rhetoric pandering to the government.

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PEI Seniors Minister ignores 9,000 seniors with disabilities

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Announces wordy “Disability Action Council Priority Areas” that ignores large population of Islanders living with disabilities

Janice Sherry Minister of Seniors - it's as if seniors with disabilities don't exist photo: CBC

Janice Sherry, Minister of Community Services, Seniors and Labour, made a press announcement yesterday on Islanders living with disabilities that conveniently ignores the 9,000 Islanders with disabilities who are 65 years and older.

By what farce does Sherry call herself the Minister for Seniors when she ignores the facts. Try to find the word “senior” in the Minister’s press release. It simply is not there. We have a minister of seniors and disability who has a psychological inability to say the two words together.

The whole press release is 718 words of baffle-gab, obfuscation and jibber jabber. It should keep her department and the disability NGOs on PEI happily spinning in self-important circles for a decade.

The rest of the so-called “action plan” is totally government rhetoric for non-action. Key phrases disguise that nothing is happening.
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The real story of PEI Easter Seals

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PEI Easter Seals is a long-running charity drive that needs to change.

Rotary-Easter-Seals--320-we Children with disabilities don’t need Easter Seals. They need respect and a chance to be full members of society.

Easter Seals has been running on PEI for more than 50 years. It’s like old idea who’s time has come. It could be a decent way to raise money but as it sits the campaign is seriously flawed.

The Easter Seals Ambassador job is emotionally abusive for the child with a disability. After three months of attention from CBC and Rotarians, the child is dropped like a stone. For a child with a learning disability, or most children, it leaves them hurt and confused. Other Provinces have acknowledged this. Ontario no longer uses under-age children for the role.

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Survey to determine needs for intellectual disabilities

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Inclusions East wants survey feedback to adapt programs to needs in Kings County PEI

By David MacDonald david@peicanada.com. Eastern Graphic

Inclusions East, the organization overseeing the Kingswood Centre and the Southern Kings Group Home in Montague, is awaiting responses from a housing needs survey that could be the first step in getting additional support for those with intellectual disabilities living in eastern PEI.

Editor – what the article doesn’t say is if the survey will widen the scope of the program to people with intellectual disabilities beyond existing clients. Secondarily, how much assistance is being given to the people being surveyed? Sending complex questionnaires to people with intellectual disabilities often results in low response rates or inaccurate responses for obvious reasons. They may not understand the questions or may be intimidated by the process. We attempted to ask these questions but gave up after holding on the line for more than 30 minutes.

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Marcia Carroll plagiarizes letter to Charlottetown Guardian

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Marcia Carroll, PEI Council of Disabled CEO and plagiarist

Marcia Carroll, PEI Council of Disabled CEO and plagiarist

Executive Director submits letter to newspaper under her signature that she stole from someone else

It’s OK to use other people’s words but it’s not ethical to claim you wrote them.

Pride turned to sorrow and then despair yesterday when I read the eloquent letter from Marcia Carroll, Executive Director of the PEI Council of People with Disabilities.

Empowering People with Disabilities was published in the Charlottetown Guardian under the name “Marcia Carroll is executive director of the P.E.I. Council of People with Disabilities.”

As soon as I read the well-written first paragraph I knew I had already seen it before. Some of it was written by Traci Walters of Independent Living in Ottawa Ontario on November 27, 2009.

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School board bans van driver with comments

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Valerie Gillespie, mother of the assaulted boy

Valerie Gillespie, mother of the assaulted boy photo: CBC

CBC News Parent Valerie Gillespie wants Szerman fired and more training at Pat and the Elephant.

P.E.I.’s Eastern School District has permanently banned a driver from transporting its students, following an assault conviction for rubbing spit on a disabled child’s face.

The incident occurred last spring. Brenton Gillespie, 14, was with his sister on a Pat and the Elephant van, a service for people with disabilities.

Gillespie has a condition causing a number of physical disabilities and which leaves him with the mental capacity of a three-year-old.

He has trouble swallowing, which leads to a tendency to spit.

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