Lobbying pays off for deaf community

Three years of lobbying for more support have finally borne fruit for the Taranaki deaf community.

An office of the Deaf Association of New Zealand opened in New Plymouth this week, to provide needs assessment, information and some interpretation services for deaf people.

“Deaf people are part of an active community, linked by a common culture and language — New Zealand sign language. They are proud of their distinct identity, and show that by describing themselves as Deaf with a capital D,” said service co-ordinator Alexis Keir.

Deaf people faced a lot of problems in the community because of communication barriers between them and hearing people, he said.

Association counsellor Grant Brewster said whenever local deaf people had needed the help of an interpreter in the past, they had to wait for one to travel from Palmerston North.

That had led to a suicide and an attempted suicide in Taranaki two years ago, he said, because those people did not have anyone with the appropriate communication skills on hand to help them when they were under stress and confused.

Other people had to move towns to find work because the support was not there for them to access employment services, said Mr Brewster.

Mr Keir said only part of his job was to help deaf people in crisis — such as with the police or when feeling isolated in hospital. Most of his job was about helping deaf people identify how to improve their everyday quality of life by accessing resources most people took for granted.

“For instance, I’ll be helping people get equipment such as faxes and TTYs (telephone typewriters) to enable them to access the public telephone system.

“Or something as simple as a flashing light doorbell, which means a deaf person living alone doesn’t have to miss visitors. There have been some situations where deaf people have left their doors unlocked all the time because they’re worried about missing callers.”

The office, situated in the Taranaki Disabilities Resource Centre, will have a fax and TTY line from Monday. Mr Keir said the office had few other resources and any offers of help would be welcomed.

Photo caption: HELPING HANDS: New Plymouth co-ordinator of the Deaf Association, Alexis Keir (left), and counsellor Grant Brewster.