Ft Myers Beach - Good Neighbor

ST INS CARES-The Sally J Pimentel Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center: Supporting a Vital Community Need

• "Cabo" Jim Schaller • Season 5 • Episode 30

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Did you know there's only one nonprofit deaf service center between Tampa and Miami? The Sally J Pimentel Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center stands as a critical lifeline serving deaf and hard of hearing individuals across five Florida counties, addressing challenges that many of us never consider.

Executive Director Amy Turner takes us behind the scenes of this vital organization, revealing the extensive range of services they provide. From amplified phones that help seniors hear their doctors and grandchildren, to youth mentoring programs in schools, to specialized support groups for deaf women facing crises—their work touches lives in profound ways. Turner explains how everyday conveniences like drive-thrus present impossible barriers for deaf individuals, highlighting the often-invisible challenges faced by this community.

The episode clarifies important ADA requirements for businesses serving deaf clients. As Turner emphasizes, providing interpreters isn't about offering translation services for another language—it's about ensuring accessibility for individuals with disabilities. The center helps facilitate these connections while also training first responders and businesses on effective communication with deaf individuals. Their work with Lee County's emergency operations has been crucial in ensuring deaf residents receive life-saving information during hurricanes and other emergencies.

Want to support this essential community resource? Visit www.dhhclife.org to learn how you can help the center continue and expand their critical services. Whether you're a business owner looking to improve accessibility or someone interested in learning sign language, the Sally J Pimentel Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center welcomes your support and involvement.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Center SWFL
Amy Turner-Executive Director
1860 Boy Scout Drive, Fort Myers, FL 33907
(239) 461-0334
(239) 247-5821 (Video Phone)
info@dhhc.life
dhhc.life


State Insurance USA
4450 Camino Real Way
Ft Myers, FL 33966
239-567-9992
100 Lovers Ln 3rd Floor
Ft Myers Beach, FL 33931
(239) 690-6300
office@StateInsuranceUSA.com
stateinsuranceusa.com
https://www.facebook.com/Stateinsuranceusa
#StateInsuranceUSA
#SupportLocal
#WeLoveOurClients

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to State Insurance USA Cares podcast, where we celebrate the heart of our communities. Each episode, we highlight local charities and nonprofits who are bringing hope, help and healing to those who need it most. Get ready to be inspired by the amazing stories of people making a difference, because together we care.

Speaker 2:

Well, hey, it's Gail Langner with State Insurance, USA State Insurance Cares back again today. I am thrilled to have my friend Amy Turner with us today. She is the Executive Director at the Sally J Pimentel Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center in Fort Myers and, Amy, thanks so much for taking some time out of your very busy day to tell us a little bit about the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center.

Speaker 3:

Well, thank you very much, Gail. I am thrilled to be here and I am very excited to share about some of the you know wonderful things that we're doing in the community to help with deaf and hard of hearing individuals.

Speaker 2:

Well, that is actually Amy and I both belong to an organization called the American Business Women's Association, so we see each other a lot. In fact, we'll be seeing each other this evening for dinner, but she actually did a presentation not too long ago that I wanted our listeners to hear. And so, Amy, first of all, I'm just out of pure curiosity. I've always wondered who is Sally J Pimentel, or who was she.

Speaker 3:

Well, Sally J Pimentel was a very active client who used to come to our center and sadly, she passed away in 2018. But she was beloved by all and she was extremely active. She provided such comfort to others. She was a friend to everyone and in 2019, her husband, Al, gifted our center a large gift in memoriam to honor Sally's legacy and from that moment, we changed our name to the Sally J Pimentel Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center. I love that we can honor her.

Speaker 2:

Okay, well, I always wondered and never really asked. So tell everyone, amy, what you do there. I know, oh my gosh, the scope is huge. I mean, I know that, but you're right off from Boy Scout and you have a beautiful facility there. What does your day-to-day look like? What does that entail?

Speaker 3:

Well, we are. If you can picture a map of the state of Florida, we are the only non-profit deaf service center between Tampa and Miami, so it's a very large territory. So anyone who is deaf or hard of hearing who needs those resources or support, we're it and we serve a very specific niche of clientele and they need our services desperately. So we provide those services. If somebody needs some support, if they need a support group, we offer a youth development program. We go into the schools and we provide mentoring to deaf children. We provide so many services for hard of hearing. We provide amplified phones for seniors who are going through age-related hearing loss so that they can hear their pharmacist or their doctor or their grandchildren. Again, if a regular phone rings at 25 decibels, the phones that we give away for free to people that are hard of hearing, they ring at 50 decibels and that's a life changer. We offer many, many services like that mentoring, one-on-one, anything you could think of deaf related we provide it.

Speaker 2:

Do you do any sign language classes at all? Like what, if I wanted to take a sign language class, would? You offer something like that.

Speaker 3:

We absolutely do. We provide sign language classes four nights a week and on Zoom, and we offer it in five or six locations. Now we have a class in Port Charlotte here at our center in Fort Myers, we have one in Lehigh Acres, Bonita Springs and one out in Naples.

Speaker 2:

Wow, I had no idea. Is that volunteer driven, is that? Or who teaches the classes?

Speaker 3:

We have paid deaf instructors. Actually, one of them is a volunteer out in Naples, but other than that, they're all paid deaf instructors.

Speaker 2:

Okay, all right. So let's say, okay, I work for state insurance. As you know what, if I have a deaf client and they want to come in and look over their policy, I think that it is up to me at state insurance to provide an interpreter. Is that correct?

Speaker 3:

Well, you are correct in the sense that the business is responsible for providing the accommodations for an individual with a disability. That is under ADA law. So, depending on what the deaf individual is requesting, that is the most effective form of communication for them Not for you, but for them. So that could be. Maybe they could get along with writing a note back and forth. That might work for them. So it's something to ask. But if they in fact request a live interpreter, then yes, it is your responsibility to provide, and any business's responsibility to provide, that interpreter. It's an accommodation.

Speaker 3:

And this is where some people get tripped up because they might think, well, I don't provide a translator or an interpreter in another language, I just don't do that with my business. Right? It's different when you view it that way, because that's not what they're asking. They're asking for an accommodation for their disability. If you provide the service to a hearing individual, then you need to provide the service to a deaf individual and if, by doing so, they require that accommodation. So, for example, if you had a person who was blind come in and they needed to take a written test, you wouldn't say to them I'm sorry, but we don't provide that in Braille, take it anyway, you would not say that.

Speaker 3:

You understand, you need to provide the test in Braille. It's very similar with deafness, but deafness is sort of an invisible disability. So sometimes we hearing people, it's hard to wrap our head around that and we think, oh, it's another language, we don't do that. Nope, it's an accommodation for an individual with a disability.

Speaker 2:

I understand so you provide interpreters. Is that correct? If I know that I have a client coming in next week and I'm going to need an interpreter, could I reach out to you, to your organization, and apply for someone to come help me, or how would that work?

Speaker 3:

Absolutely yes, we do provide interpreting services, and there's four ways that you can reach out to us. You can go on our website and there's an interpreter request form, which is the quickest and easiest way. Or on our website, we have a phone number listed. You can just text us and say, hey, I need an interpreter. Or you can call us, or you can send us an email direct and we can provide that interpreter. We'll coordinate the appointment with you. Or we can also provide video interpreting. Just depends on what you're looking for.

Speaker 2:

Okay, so the community really needs to know that you have this awesome accommodation. I'm sure you're out there in the community letting people know that you're there and all the wonderful things that you provide.

Speaker 3:

We do, and thank you for mentioning that, because this morning we were just finishing up our three day in a row training that we provided and we trained the entire, every single firefighter for the city of Fort Myers Fire Department and we were in and out in an hour. We provide basic sign language words for their business pertaining to you know first responders on call, and then we also taught a little bit about ADA law and what's required, and we taught about you know how to interact with a deaf person, what to look for, how do you recognize a deaf person and what can you do, and so we provide that training to any business for free, anywhere here in the five-county area.

Speaker 2:

Wow, that's incredible. Well, that has to cost you a lot of money. I know you're a nonprofit. Is it all fundraising? Is that the way that you gather most of your funds to run your business?

Speaker 3:

Three-quarters of our funding comes from grants.

Speaker 2:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

And the rest of our funding comes from interpreting services and sign language classes and fundraising.

Speaker 2:

Yes.

Speaker 3:

Yes, and, and we are extremely, extremely grateful for people and businesses that have recognized what how important our services are to other people in the community, and without that support we would not be able to do what we do.

Speaker 3:

And because of generous donors like you Blake Chapman from State Insurance USA Because of donations and supporters like that, we are able to offer our deaf youth program to deaf children. We're able to provide support groups to deaf women, and these things are so crucial, like. I'll tell you something, gail if you or I we're hearing people if we were going through some sort of a crisis and we had some sort of issues that we're dealing with mentally, we could walk into any local church. Right now, we could just get in the car and go drive to any local church. We could pick up the phone and make an appointment with a counselor. And that is not the case with a deaf woman. A deaf woman has to have an interpreter. They have to find a counselor that is going to provide that interpreter for them. If they walked into a church, unless somebody there knows sign language, they're not going to be able to help them or understand what they're going through, and we provide a support group just for that purpose.

Speaker 3:

And it's because of those funders that make that happen.

Speaker 2:

Right, that's incredible. I know that when you did the presentation for American Business Women's Association, you told the story about the gal that ran to Panera or to Starbucks. Would you tell our listeners about that? Sure.

Speaker 3:

Sure, it was about six months ago. There was a coworker here at my office and she's deaf, and she popped her head into my office and she signed hey, I'm going to run to Panera, you know, across the street, I'm hungry. Are you hungry, do you want anything? And I signed back yeah, you know what, get me a sandwich and I'll have a cup of soup. So she left. You know she should be back in about 10, 15 minutes and you know, 30 minutes later I'm thinking where is she? Why is she not back yet? So she comes back and I'm like where were you? I don't understand, it's just right across the street. And she said Amy, I'm deaf. And of course I asked the question again, not understanding what that had anything to do with it. And what she said was I'm deaf, I can't go through the drive-thru.

Speaker 3:

And I paused, and I was not thinking about the 30 minutes that it took her to go do it. What I was thinking in my head was my goodness, how many times have I gone through a drive-thru in the last 20 years with my children? Or how many times have I driven through Starbucks because it's raining outside and, just for convenience sake, went through the drive-thru?

Speaker 2:

Right.

Speaker 3:

And a deaf person cannot do that because of the way it's set up and working here at a deaf center. Unless I worked here, I would not have known something like that.

Speaker 2:

Right.

Speaker 3:

I would not have realized the barriers that exist in everyday life, that deaf people face.

Speaker 2:

I know you talked about hurricane preparedness and so on too. Didn't you say something about when they send the announcements out to evacuate and all of that? Weren't you talking? About that as well.

Speaker 3:

Yes, and I will tell you. So. It's extremely important for deaf individuals to have that on-screen interpreter during important public communications like press conferences, for evacuations, especially mandatory evacuations, or for public safety. And I am so excited because we are extremely lucky that Lee County here, their Lee County government and Lee County emergency operations they have started a Ready Lee Resilience Movement where they're including agencies like ours to have a seat at the table so that they can improve those things to make sure that an interpreter is provided, to make sure that communication is happening so that a deaf person can be alerted that there's a boil water notice in their neighborhood after the hurricane. They're working on ways for, you know, you can now text to 911 things that were you know couldn't be done before. It was only a phone call, right. So, yeah, we're extremely lucky that we're part of that partnership and that collaboration to improve public safety and we're working on that now.

Speaker 2:

I'm so glad to hear that, especially after Ian and everything that we went through here in Fort Myers Beach and in Lee County, I'm thrilled to hear that that is on the horizon. So just to wrap up, amy, if you could name one thing that you probably need more than anything, what would it be? How can we help? How can everyone help?

Speaker 3:

Well, I appreciate that. You know, because of the fact that we're a very small nonprofit agency, we have five individuals working for us and we're responsible for five counties. So funding, funding, funding, Funding is always an issue, especially with funds coming from government grants that are unstable. Right now, we absolutely can use funding, so we are looking for board members that are able to help us connect to people with funds, and that would be a big thing for us.

Speaker 3:

That would be a game changer to be able to continue to serve and expand our services, which are so critically needed right now.

Speaker 2:

What's the best way to reach you, Amy?

Speaker 3:

You can reach me through our website, which is www. dhhc. life. L-i-f. As in Frank E, that's our initials of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center. Dhhclife. L-i-f. As in Frank E, that's our initials of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Center dhhclife. Or you can email me directly at amyturner A-M-Y-T-U-R-N-E-R at dhhc. life.

Speaker 2:

Okay, thank you.

Speaker 3:

Thank you for having me.

Speaker 2:

Amy, I know you're a busy gal and I appreciate you taking the time out today to tell everyone around you and about you and what you do, and I appreciate you being such a dear friend and all you do. So I will see you later, thanks. Thanks for joining me today.

Speaker 3:

Right back at you. Thank you so much.

Speaker 2:

All right, take care Bye.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for joining us on State Insurance USA Cares. We hope today's story uplifted and inspired you If you'd like to support or learn more about the incredible Bye.