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National Consensus Conference
Ryun testifies before the Ways and Means Committee
Representative Jim Ryun (R-KS) gave testimony on the Hearing Aid Tax Credit Bill (that he introduced) to the Ways and Means Committee November 16, 2005. This is very important as the W&M Committee needs to get behind this legislation if it is to go anywhere. This is a good time to get in touch with your legislators if they have not already signed on as co sponsors. Currently there are 82 co sponsors of the House bill.

To call your Representative, dial toll-free 1-877-224-0041 to be connected to the Capitol switchboard. Ask to speak to your Representative or ask the Capitol operator to look him/her up by zip code, if you do not know the name of your Representative. Once connected to their office, please state that you are calling to ask your Member of Congress to support H.R. 414, the “Hearing Aid Assistance Tax Credit Act.” Let them know that increased access to hearing aids will significantly improve your quality of life and independence.

To email your Representative, visit www.congress.org to find your representative's email address. Put the Hearing Aid Tax Credit in the subject line and send a short email explaining how important hearing aids are to you and your life.

To view Ryun’s testimony go to H.R.414 Testimony

FCC Publishes Notice Already on Captioned Telephone Petition

On October 31, 2005, Hearing Loss Association and 12 other organizations filed a petition for rulemaking asking the FCC to mandate captioned telephone nationwide and to approve IP captioned telephone relay service. The FCC has now released this petition for public comment (Docket 03-123). The comment period will be set once the notice is published in the federal register. At that point it will be very important that advocates send in comments telling the FCC how and why captioned telephone is so important for you.
To view the FCC notice go to
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-05-2961A1.doc
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-05-2961A1.pdf
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-05-2961A1.txt

FCC Extends Deadline for TV Captioning Petition
The FCC has extended the deadline for reply comments on the closed captioning petition submitted by consumer organizations. In 2004, SHHH (now Hearing Loss Association of America), collaborated with National Association of the Deaf, Association of Late Deafened Adults, Deaf and Hard of Hearing Consumer Advocacy Network, Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, Inc., the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Consumer Advocacy Network and proposed to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rules related to captioning quality and enforcement. The National Association of Broadcasters, that is against any new regulations to improve the quality of TV captioning, requested an extension of the deadline which the FCC granted.

The new deadline for comments is now December 16, 2005. If you have not already sent in comments there is still time now. Because there is so much opposition you need to send in comments on how important quality captioning is to you.

To send in your comments go to:
http://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/upload_v2.cgi
The docket number is 05-231.

Tell the FCC how important captioning is to you and why the quality of captioning is so critical. What kinds of captioning problems do you experience when you are watching TV? (For example, captions disappear one hour into a two-hour movie; captions are illegible). Have you ever tried to contact a video programming distributor to complain or ask questions about the captioning on their program? If so, what kind of experience did you have? If the FCC put a form up on their website that you could use when filing a complaint about captioning with a video programming distributor/producer, would that be helpful to you?


Emergency Conference Proceedings Now Available On-Line
The Accessible Emergency Notification and Communication: State of the Science Conference sponsored by the RERC on Telecommunications Access was held November 2-3, 2005 in Washington, D.C. Full proceedings from this timely and successful conference can be found at
http://www.at508.com
http://www.tvworldwide.com/events/nod/051102/default.cfm

FCC Commissioners Nominated
President Bush has nominated Deborah Tate, previously Director of the Tennessee Regulatory Authority, to serve as an FCC Commissioner. Commissioner Copps has also been re-nominated to serve a second term. To see the remarks of Chairman Kevin J. Martin go to http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-262162A1.doc.

Hearing Aid Tax Credit Update – As of December 1, 2005
As of December 1, 2005, there are 83 co-sponsors in the House and 13 co-sponsors in the Senate. I encourage you to see our most updated list of co-sponsors, and if your elected officials are not on the list, write a letter requesting their support.

What is the hearing aid tax credit?
List of current co-sponsors in the House and the Senate.
See a sample letter.


Upcoming meetings
December 8, 2005 – Deaf and Hard of Hearing Alliance meeting
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