A blind woman, a ‘dream job,’ and the toll of the government shutdown – USA Today
Jack Gruber, USA Today
A blind woman, a ‘dream job,’ and the toll of the government shutdown
The historic funding crisis inflicted pain on Americans across the country. Christine Grassman still hasn’t fully recovered.
By Zachary Schermele, USA TODAY
FALLS CHURCH, VA – It all started right before dragon boat practice.
Christine Grassman and her husband, Gary, had an important race coming up. In less than a week, the couple would be off to Florida for the national championships.
Much like the Grassmans, who are blind, dragon boating is often misunderstood. It’s confused with rowing, but they’re not the same. Dragon boaters use paddles and face forward; rowers use oars and face backward.
Read more: I survived breast cancer. Now I race dragon boats for Team USA. | Opinion
The lesser-known sport is also favored among people with disabilities – “paradragons,” as Christine and Gary call themselves. The two were “bit by the dragon” just after the coronavirus pandemic. Roughly four years later, Christine, at 56, is the president of their team, the “Out of Sight Dragons.”
On the morning of Oct. 11, Christine’s phone lit up with a text just as she and Gary were gearing up for one of their last workouts before nationals. Her supervisor at the U.S. Department of Education relayed a message that their team had received “reduction in force” notices. That’s Washington-speak for a layoff. She instructed Christine to check her own email.
She did. She let a “few choice phrases” slip. Her last day would be Dec. 9.
Video source: USA Today
Christine was distraught. She also wasn’t alone. President Donald Trump’s administration fired more than 4,000 federal workers that weekend, just 10 days into what eventually became the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.
Read more: Education Department lays off roughly 20% of its workforce amid shutdown
In the past, such ordeals caused furloughs that, while harmful, were only temporary and ended with federal workers eventually getting paid for their forced time away from the office. That’s what happened during Trump’s first term, when the government shuttered for 35 days, setting a record at the time.
In Trump’s second term, the administration’s decision to fire its employees during another historic shutdown became one of the funding crisis’ defining challenges.
The upheaval that people like Christine endured underscored just how harmful Washington gridlock can become for many Americans, including civil servants. That tumult has in turn affected some people with disabilities, who are employed at slightly higher rates in the federal government versus the private sector. Federal law has historically required agencies to plan to meet specific hiring goals for people with disabilities.Read more: Their time at the Education Department may be over. The grieving isn’t.
Claire Stanley, director of advocacy and governmental affairs for the American Council of the Blind, said Christine wasn’t the only blind or low-vision federal employee she knew who was initially laid off during the shutdown. Many others, though not fired, spent weeks without pay.
“All of us were kind of holding our breath,” she said.
Christine spoke to USA TODAY for this story in her personal capacity as an advocate for other blind people – she is the president of the Fairfax chapter of the National Federation of the Blind of Virginia – and as a member of AFGE Local 252, the union for Education Department employees. She said her views are not representative of the agency.
From a ‘dream job’ to nightmares
Christine and Pixie, Jack Gruber, USA Today.
On Oct. 29, four weeks into the government shutdown, Christine sat in her apartment, resting both palms flat on her dining room table. Pixie, her Norwegian forest cat, lounged on a couch nearby, his sandy brown fur complementing the dark maroon upholstery.
For a multitude of reasons, she was on a higher dose of anxiety medication. Worries about caring for her aging parents usually live more toward the back of her mind. Since she was fired, those fears had shoved their way to the front.
Her mother has Alzheimer’s; her father, a longtime firefighter, has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. They both still live in Long Island, New York, Christine’s hometown.
Nightmares were making it harder to sleep. Her stomach hurt frequently.
Despite all those concerns, the previous 24 hours had brought some hope. On Oct. 28, a federal judge in California temporarily paused her firing, along with thousands of others. With most federal agencies still largely closed, though, she wasn’t back on the job yet.
The news offered only limited comfort. It did little to soothe her concerns about the long-term future of the federal law she has helped implement since 2019. Though housed in the Education Department, it’s not really about education at all.
Editor’s Note: Read the rest of the story, at the below link.
Continue/Read Original Article Here: A blind woman, a ‘dream job,’ and the toll of the government shutdown
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