THE BLIND LEADING

Maine is taking another step toward bringing the blind and visually impaired into the economic and cultural mainstream. Leading the way is the Iris Network, the new name for the old Maine Institute for the Blind, started 99 years ago. The Iris Network board of directors has just approved a plan to convert and expand its old boarding home in Portland into a low-rent independent-living apartment house.

The l7 directors who made the decision include five who are blind or visually impaired and have helped lead the way for others to lift themselves from dependency to independent and productive living. The advisory board chairman is Jeremiah D. Newbury, a retired partner in the Pierce Atwood law firm and one of three blind lawyers on the board. Steven Obremski, who turned 54 last month, has been totally blind for 20 years yet manages the Iris Network as its resident and chief executive officer and in spare time skis and goes sailing.

At its Portland campus, Iris Network offers training in computers that have Braille keyboards and can transfer digital and voiced material back and forth. That single high-tech device opens new employment opportunities. The network plans to open a similar training center in the Bangor area within a few years. Its present office in Brewer, the Maine Airs center (for Audio Information and Reading Services), is where volunteer readers put newspapers’ news and advertisements onto a second channel of Maine Public Radio.

The new apartment house in Portland will have 25 one-bedroom units and six two-bedroom units. Each will have its own kitchen and bathroom. There will be a laundry room, a computer room, and a common room for group activities and one optional meal a day. Attendants will help with housekeeping, transportation, shopping, handling mail and check writing. The present three-story boarding home is still half full. But President Obremski says all 14 of its residents are eager for the new quarters, including one man who has been there for 33 years. A survey indicates that there will be plenty of applicants for the other units.

Assuming that the Maine State Housing authority provides much of the financing and a likely fund drive provides for staffing needs, Maine will have come still farther from the old custodial system, with its broom-making and chair-caning.