Multi-News from TAD

Posted in: TAD Announcements by TAD Administration on February 26, 2008 | 0 Comments

(Photo: From left to right: Terri Levine, new Miss Deaf Texas Pageant director, TAD President Steve Baldwin, and TAD Conference chair Karen Kirby.)

The Texas Association of the Deaf wishes to make several announcements for the Texas Deaf Community and the public in general. The four-fold news release is mostly based on exciting decisions made by the TAD Executive Board in El Paso on January 12, 2008.

First and foremost is the decision to select San Antonio as the site of the 2009 45th Biennial Conference at El Tropicano Hotel from June 11 to 13. Thanks to our new conference chairperson Karen Kirby of San Antonio and her committee, we have a great hotel on Riverwalk! This hotel is used to hosting Deaf functions and has spent 17 million dollars renovating. Ms. Kirby has ample conference planning experience and has already formed a talented, experienced and enthusiastic committee. She will be making periodic announcements from time to time during the next many months leading up to the conference. She may be reached on the TAD website. So mark your calendar for June 11 to 13, 2009.

TAD Board also approved the appointment of Ms. Terri Levine of San Antonio as the next director of the Miss Deaf Texas Pageant. She will assume her responsibilities after the NAD Conference this July. Ms Levine, the former Miss Deaf Indiana in 1982, has already formed her own committee of many TAD members from Austin, San Antonio and elsewhere. She too will be informing Deaf Texans about her upcoming activities in the future.

Incidentally, at the 2007 Texas Society of Interpreters for the Deaf Conference in Irving, Miss Deaf Texas Pageant debuted for the first time outside of TAD Conference. The experiment was a financial success and more than 300 attended the pageant, which was won by Katherine Murch of Corpus Christi. MDTP may again return to TSID Conference in 2011. The TAD Board members voted to have the pageant back once again for its conference in 2009. The auditorium for the pageant is adjacent to the hotel, which makes it very convenient!

On March lst, TAD officers and committee members will appear on stage at the Crockett Center in Austin for 25 minutes at the upcoming Deaf Nation Expo in Austin at about noon time. Be sure to visit the TAD booth, which is one of the 80 exhibit booths at the Expo.

TAD also wishes to announce a special subpage on its website, deaftexas.org in which the reader can find a number of meeting minutes posted for anyone interested in the past and present membership and board actions. The minutes posted have been approved for public perusal. Any questions about the minutes may be forwarded to the TAD secretary Marianne Sasseen on the TAD website.

TAD was established in 1886 and serves as a non-profit organization that advocates for the rights of deaf and hard of hearing Texans. Membership is only $15 a year and $10 for qualified seniors. The Deaf Texan newsletter is mailed or e-mailed four times a year to members, which has reached the 400 mark already! Because of TAD, we enjoy relay and video services and other benefits made possible by past endeavors of dedicated TAD members the last 30 years. TAD is also affiliated with the National Association of the Deaf. For further information on the significance of your deaf state association, go to www.deaftexas.org.