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economist suntribune thursday feb 10 2000 3 more than 1400 york region resident are at various stages of blindness staff photomike barrett staff reporter fred simpson left gets a lesson in crossing the street while visually impaired with the help of cnib orientation and mobility instructor connie weber a journey into darkness by fred simpson staff writer crossing yonge street at high noon can be a daunting experience for even the most hardened pedestrian try it blindfolded thats what happened to a cou ple of media types last monday at the corner of yonge street and bantry avenue in richmond hill the occasion was the local kick- off to white cane week organized by the canadian council of the blind ccb and the canadian national institute for the blind cnib this particular scenario has to do with the recent installation by york region of audible signals at the aforementioned intersection just hang on to my forearm and ill lead you across the street said the cnib worker seconds after she blacked out my world by strapping a pair of special glasses over my eyes v all that was left of my vision was a tiny hole through which i could look out at ver limited world in front of me with no peripheral vision this is the world as seen through the eyes of 95000 people in canada alone people with glaucoma or some other equally debilitating dis ease that number is growing by 8000 a year there are currently 1430 people in various stages of blindness who are clients with the york region office of the cnib im playing the part of one of these clients just imagine that as you prepare to step off the curb all you can hear is the noise and confu sion of late morning traffic along yonge street then someone pushes the audi ble button attached to a sign and you hear what sounds like a bird chirping sound this indicates that the traffic surge is going in a eastwest direc tion or it might be the unmistak able sounds of a cuckoo which tells you the traffic is now moving north and south you just want out of there as chris philp traffic systems manager for york region explains what its all about before you embark on your journey these audible signals have been here since last spring philp said there is one on each corner of the intersection so that anyone using them can line themselves up and know where they are going to and corning from the audible signs were first adopted as a pilot project in the region late last year in cooperation with the cnib philp said five more audible signs will be installed at in the region this year at first we worried that the sounds might disturb nearby resi dents but weve had no complaints whatsoever meanwhile back at the curb the journey begins the attendant to whose arm you are clinging somewhat franti cally tells you to push the audible button after several futile stabs you finally find the button when you hear the next surge its our turn to cross the attendant says tension builds then the cuckoo bird breaks into song and you are off with the sound of traffic smashing against your ear drums on the other side you pause then highstep it over the curb its all over you are safely across the street the blindfold comes off and the world is a welcome sight to behold but for people like beverly berger of nobleton the journey doesnt end here berger is a volunteer for the cnib and has been totally blind for the past 18 years she and several others are at the cnib york region service centre to receive white cane week awards for their contributions to the cnib my blindness was caused by retinal detachments berger explained her threeyearold labrador retriever at her side she acknowledged that losing her vision was a psychological blow for the first two years i wasnt too nice of a person to be around i went through the whole grieving process of bitterness anger denial and all that stuff she said at first i wouldnt use a white cane because people would know i was blind i just wanted to be the bev i was before berger finally admitted to herself that she needed help to get my life back in gear thats when the cnib was there for me jobs grants here mps say by jennifer brown staff writer ask local mps if their ridings benefited from the federal govern ments controversial 1 billion jobs program and you may get a mixed bag of answers while the prime minister declared earlier this week that every riding in the country bene fited apparently it depends on which part of the program youre talking about a spokesperson from maurizio bevilacquas office in ottawa said monday that the riding of vaughankingaurora 1 didnt receive a penny from the transi tional job fund citing a require ment that a community have an unemployment rate of 12 per cent double york regions current jobless rate the message was the same from thornhill mp elinor caplans office assistant seth rudin indi cated the money went to areas of higher unemployment we fortunately dont fall into that category rudin said markham conservative mp jim jones says markham didnt receive any either but is unsure how much youth job money his com munity received local mps say they dont know exactly how much job money flows through their ridings each year in fact one spokesperson in bevilacquas office said that because there are so many job funds and job strategies it is diffi cult to sort it all out and when pushed for a figure rudin suggested the local office of hrdc the agency responsible for administering the funds could indicate how much funding is pro vided to youth job strategies in the riding however after calling the hrdc office in richmond hill the economist sunstouffville tribune was told to speak to the departmental spokesperson whose office is in montreal that call was not returned initially the attack on the feder al jobs fund was on the transition al job funding but it quickly spread to other job creation funds jim jones markham mp doesnt believe in the liberals job creation strategies aclministered through hrdc the lbillion worth of programs found in an internal hrdc audit to suffer from bookkeeping and administrative mishandling included grants for literacy pro grams youth onthejob training programs and summer jobs under youth employment ini tiatives a richmond hill comput er firm was one of five programs in ontario to be audited first interactive computer college received 63000 for the program which employed and trained five people it was considered a york regionwide program the company grant was one of 37 programs recently flagged for reauditing by the government it appears 21 per cent of the funding still required further doc umentation said york north mp karen kraft sloan there was another onsite review feb 2 and there will be a followup to that people have the misconcep tion that the 1 billion is lost when it is really that there are paperwork issues here she said markham mp jim jones said he doesnt believe in job creation pro grams such as those promoted by the liberals i dont believe in that stuff i dont push for it what creates jobs is lower taxes this is not the best use of taxpayer dollars he said conceding that while markham is largely affluent some areas could use some assistance 4747 hwy 7 unipnville east of kennedy 5f 4275524 winter sale final week warm up to great savings storewide swft