HERMITAGE, Pa. – David Smith of Warren rivets an industrial-grade shovel on the production floor at Keystone Blind Association.
Smith, who is visually impaired, uses specially adapted equipment in the manufacturing area of the organization’s Hermitage, Pa., headquarters. Workers there assemble shovels, rakes and other tools for Grainger. The tools are sold to the state and federal offices through cooperative purchasing.
Smith has a hereditary condition called retinitis pigmentosa that’s causing him to lose vision, but he’s grateful he found Keystone, which allows him to maintain employment.
“I appreciate the fact that they gave me a chance to come here every day and do what I do,” says Smith, a production worker. “And I like to have fun, joke around and I like doing things with my hands – building stuff …”
After he lost his job when his former employer closed, a friend told him about Keystone. He called, was interviewed over the phone and hired. That was five years ago.
Smith is one of about 500 people employed across the state through the Keystone Blind Association and its organizations, which include Keystone Vocational Services and Keystone Independence Management. It also has offices in New Castle and Meadville.
“We have a two-part mission to empower, educate and employ individuals with vision loss or other disabilities,” says Laurie Staph, president and CEO.
Services
The agency offers blindness prevention programs as well as assistive technologies. Those technologies enable someone who is totally blind to use a tablet or a smartphone and to do online banking. Such programs help visually impaired people maintain employment.
Keystone also provides vision rehabilitation therapy services, going to a client’s home or workplace and teaching them how to light the space based on their visual acuity. It provides other services for people with vision impairment too.
Most individuals are referred to Keystone by a physician or another agency, Staph says.
“Our employment piece is the other half of our mission, and we have jobs that are specifically for individuals who are legally blind,” Staph says. “But then we have other jobs that are through the state-use program that support any individual with any disability that’s documentable.”
Most of the organization’s contracts come through the National Association for the Blind.
“Typically, we train people from scratch here,” Staph says.
The Work
Production floor machinery is adapted for blind and visually impaired individuals to prevent injury. Grants from the National Association for the Blind pay for that.
“One of the biggest things that we’re always looking for is people who have some computer skills, but that’s hard to find, because a lot of people don’t know that there’s agencies out there like ours that can help with those,” Staph says. The agency employs a specialist who teaches people with visual impairment to work on computers.
“She can work with them individually to do the computer training,” the CEO adds.
Keystone also provides mobility training to those who need it.
“I really can’t say that there is anything that they can’t do without a little bit of training,” she says.
Individuals who are blind or disabled sometimes lack the confidence to go into the world and feel like a contributing taxpayer and like everybody else, Staph explains.
And most employers aren’t going to spend $3,000 for a computer screen that allows an employee to see to do their work.
“But a place like ours, we would figure out a way to get that funding, or get the grant, or do whatever we need to do to get that individual back to work,” Staph says.
Besides the tools manufactured at the headquarters, Keystone employees maintain 34 interstate highway rest areas, work at five photo identification centers, provide janitorial services for state offices, manufacture toilet paper for the state, assemble hard hats for major distributors and offer shredding services.
Mine Mailroom
Others employed by Keystone through a federal contract work in the mailroom of a former limestone mine in Boyers, Pa., in Butler County, called Iron Mountain. It’s a secure underground storage facility and data
center.
Dave Miller of Butler County lost his vision 25 years ago. He helps process incoming and outgoing mail. But he spends much of his workday on a computer, with assistive technology that reads what’s on the screen.
Before losing his vision, Miller worked as a grocery store manager and as a meat cutter. After going blind, he worked part time at a Christian ministry. He was there for 10 years but the job didn’t offer advancement opportunities.
“So that’s why, when this position came available, I jumped on it so I could better my life by becoming a full-time employee and being able to support myself,” Miller says.
Benefits
But the benefits extend beyond financial.
After recovering from the incident that caused him to lose his vision, the days were long, Miller explains.
“You need a purpose in life,” he says. “You sit at home, and the four walls start closing in on you. You need to do something. So, I was very motivated after I lost my sight to become as much of an independent person as I was when I had sight.”
His job in the mine helps him achieve that.
Keystone’s team includes 22 direct employees and 10 subcontractors.
Craig Felix, the facility security officer in the mine’s mailroom, has been with Keystone since 2017. Brett Hedglin, the program manager for Keystone Vocational Services, oversees the performance of the contract and government relations. Both Felix and Hegdlin are sighted.
Hedglin says that when the contract changed to employ blind people, there was a learning curve.
“But after you found that comfortable spot, it became a very rewarding experience,” he adds. “And it just goes to prove that anything can be done in a non-sighted world that can be done in a fully sighted world. And we’ve proved that, and that’s something I’m very proud of.”
And Miller is a valued member of the team, Felix says.
“Dave has been a tremendous asset to this program and to the leadership team here in Boyers,” he says.
Miller participates in recruiting efforts in other states and serves as an advocate for Keystone through his connections with other organizations, Felix explains.
“And it has truly been a tremendous opportunity for Boyers to bring together a whole new team to perform contractual obligations under this contract successfully for the past eight years – it is the team that has been put together and built and truly
supported by everyone in this organization,” he
says.
Melissa Means, vice president of human resources at Keystone, says the organization works to increase its number of contracts to try to offer more placement opportunities for people with disabilities.
Keystone has placed employees at nearly 70 locations statewide. While it may take longer to train a person with a disability, once they learn it, they’re dedicated employees, she says.
Often someone with a disability is nervous to learn a new position so trainers provide encouragement. And Means has seen people’s lives change through securing employment. She recalls one man who had never worked before. He was fearful of getting a job, worried he’d log too many hours and lose his Social Security benefits.
“And he ended up going off Social Security and becoming a full-time employee,” Means says. “And his mother even called in and said how happy she was that he was making all these friends and how busy he was, going out to dinner and having plans after work. And it was just a great story.”
Pictured at top: Laurie Staph and Melissa Means, president/CEO and vice president of human resources of Keystone Blind Association, at the organization’s Hermitage, Pa., headquarters.