BayLines Express
October 25, 2026
From the Editor
Bay State Council of the Blind is deeply sad to report the passing of Steve Dresser on October 2nd. Steve was a longtime BSCB member, host of the Council Connection podcast, and a great friend to many. Information on a virtual memorial held via Zoom will be available through the BSCB email announcement list at a later time.
I knew Steve from a fairly young age, as his late wife, Marcia, was my TVI from the time I was in third grade until I graduated high school in 2011. I kept close contact with them throughout my undergrad years, and when Marcia passed in 2015 I kept in touch with Steve, frequently getting together over the holidays at Venetian Moon, a favorite restaurant spot of his and Marcia’s in Reading. I have fond memories of both Steve and Marcia, and am devastated at Steve’s passing, but take solace that he is no longer suffering.
Don’t forget about our blog! You can read member spotlight articles and all past member-submitted articles to BayLines Express by going to https://acbofma.org/blog. Blog posts are ordered newest to oldest, and there are several of them per page. Each individual post’s title is a link that will take you to the full body of text.
If you would like to contribute information or comment on ways to improve BayLines Express, please contact Dianna Leonard at newsletter@acbofma.org. And if you have an idea for a monthly article and would like to contribute your writing, please contact Myra Ross at newsletter@acbofma.org. The newsletter mailbox is shared between Myra and Dianna.
News from the Board
The Board last met on Monday, October 12, 2026. All board members and committee chairs except for Harry Duchesne were in attendance, as well as other BSCB members.
Nora Nagle has resigned from the board, and will remain active in BSCB, with her expertise in transportation matters. The vacated seat will not be filled until our convention in the spring.
Discussion is ongoing about a potential use of Our Space Our Place funds, and we hope to have a proposal by the next board meeting in November.
Jennifer Harnish will be sending out a description of a Good Neighbor program that was initiated by Alliance on Aging and Vision Loss and which we might use to help members in times of need. She would also be glad to have BSCB members assist with this project.
We have submitted necessary funding to the national American Council of the Blind office so that our deceased member, Steve Dresser, can become an ACB angel. The process will be completed closer to the time of the next ACB National Convention in July.
We will be donating $250 to the Disability Policy Consortium, which does excellent work with the entire Massachusetts disability community.
The BSCB website is near completion, and Simon Miner and Kayla Bentas will discuss it at our fall conference.
The board decided to offer free membership for first time BSCB members for the following year. We will extend this offer to people in Rhode Island and New Hampshire, as neither state has an ACB affiliate at this point.
Fall conference planning is well under way, and the registration form will be out soon. Please let Sharon know at strzal@charter.net if you would like to add a deceased member from the last couple of years to our tribute at the conference.
The next Board meeting will be on Sunday, November 8.
Events Calendar
The 2026 BSCB Fall Conference will take place on Saturday, November 21 in a hybrid fashion in-person at The Carroll Center for the Blind in Newton, and remotely via Zoom. Up to date information, including the conference agenda and registration form, will be shared closer to the date via the BSCB-Announce email list.
The next meeting of Blind and Visually Impaired User Group (VIBUG) will take place on Saturday, November 14, 2026 at 1:00pm via Zoom. Further information and how to join is listed at https://vibug.org/.
The next Perkins Library Without Walls will meet in November of 2026. To RSVP or listen to the upcoming LWW schedule, call the voice mailbox system at (617) 972-7852.
There will be no Third Thursday with the BSCB in November. Instead, the next Third Thursday will take place on December 17 at 8:00 PM via Zoom, where Simon Miner and Kayla Bentas will present the new and improved BSCB website. Please be sure to subscribe to our Announce List at bscb-announce+subscribe@acblists.org to stay up to date.
Below are landing page links for the MCB Rehabilitation Council (RC), and the MCB Statutory Advisory Board (SAB). You may want to bookmark them and check them often for time-sensitive entries. They contain details of upcoming events and meetings, recordings of recent meetings, and other relevant information.
RC landing page: https://www.mass.gov/orgs/mcb-rehabilitation-council
SAB landing page: https://www.mass.gov/orgs/mcb-statutory-advisory-board
News from the Web
Being Heumann, an Apple TV film which will be available to stream starting November 13, focuses on late disability rights activist Judy Heumann and the disability rights movement. The below article outlines how a fully accessible set was designed for the cast of disabled actors.
How the ‘Being Heumann’ Crew Built a Set for Its Disabled Cast on the Fly
You may have heard about the new Green Line trains rolling out to the MBTA. While this next article isn’t necessarily disability focused as per usual, some of our readers who take the T may be impacted.
MBTA Green Line Platform Upgrades Will Require Second Round of Construction for New Trains
A lot of us rely on radio for many things, whether it be entertainment or news related. However, with the advances in technology and internet streaming, traditional, local AM and FM radio may be left in the past.
The Slow Death of Local AM and FM Radio
What is the Audio Description Project?
By Dianna Leonard
Many of you may have heard of the Audio Description Project (ADP), an initiative of the American Council of the Blind (ACB), of which Bay State is an affiliate. But what does the ADP do?
Some think we provide audio description services, but that is not the case. Instead, we advocate for high-quality audio description in film, TV, performing arts and museums, educational materials, and other relevant forms of visual media. We also maintain a current database of over 15,000 film and series titles (at the time of writing this in mid-October), on various streaming services. Separately, we provide a sort of audio description “TV Guide,” where you can find which programs on broadcast networks offer AD, and at what times. The ADP started in 2009 and, since then, has continued to thrive.
A day in the life of my job as the ADP Coordinator primarily involves sending and responding to emails, and taking data sent to me by streaming services such as Netflix or Prime Video, uploading that data to the ADP website, and adding those titles to our film and series database. Sometimes it involves simply matching a title to one that already exists in our system, or it can get more involved where I’d have to manually create a brand new entry, meaning it’s a brand new title for us. In that case, I go to the Internet Movie Database, or IMDb, to find the title so that I can cross-reference the content rating and production studio, as those are things ADP website visitors can filter by when searching through our database. Sometimes it’s a case where it’s a newer remake of an older title, or simply a title with the same name but made in a different year and with a separate production studio, and in that case more research may be utilized to determine how to properly represent it.
I might also have a committee meeting that night. The ADP has several subcommittees made up solely of volunteers. The committees include Benefits of Audio Description in Education (BADIE); video gaming; performing arts, parks, and museums; public sector, or Section 508; and media, which primarily refers to audio description in film and television. Each committee has a set of goals that they work on over time, and specifically with the BADIE committee, an annual essay contest is run where winners are chosen in several categories; the grand prize winner reads their essay in a recorded video at the ACB National Convention. This year, the media subcommittee has focused on contacting the FCC regarding accessible emergency alerts, as well as disseminating best practices guidelines in text to speech (TTS) audio description narrators to various streaming services. Some of the services actually approached us to see the guidelines and use them to better help their use of TTS as a stand-in for a human narrator. The committee also sent out a survey on the accessibility and usability of streaming services, and have compiled the data and are in talks on how to proceed sending that data out to the various streaming services.
Speaking of the convention, ADP often has events during that time. In 2026, ADP programming took place during the virtual week and consisted of several panel discussions, as well as a film screening and Q&A. The panels focused on topics such as next generation TV, performing arts advances, what happens with an audio description file and why it might not always go with the media when changing streaming services, and an overview of the new and improved ADP website. We also co-hosted an event with ACB Students where we streamed Brailled It, a documentary film made in 2024 which followed several young competitors at that year’s Braille Challenge finals in Los Angeles. The film features open audio description and closed captioning baked in, meaning everyone is able to watch in a fully accessible way; the filmmaker and one of the students involved in the documentary were there for a panel discussion afterward.
ADP also gives out awards, which is different from the AD Awards Gala, which I’ll get to. The ADP Awards are given out in several categories such as performing arts, public sector, as well as several awards named after pioneers in audio description such as Barry Levine, for example. The awards committee meets and collects submissions for a period before decisions are made on who receives which one. The recipients are then recorded and edited together in an audio described video that airs during the ACB Convention in the summer.
Finally, we have the Audio Description Awards Gala. Started in 2021, the gala is the most accessible awards show in the world. Featuring audio description, closed captioning, American Sign Language, and a Spanish interpretation, the gala airs in November simultaneously on YouTube and Peacock. NBC has worked with the ADP to provide filming space at 30 Rock in New York City, where the hosts of the gala are filmed. Awards presenters and recipients give their remarks virtually, and it all comes together in a video showcasing the best in audio description talent. There’s also the opportunity for the community to vote on “people’s choice” titles for a film and TV series which aired in the recent calendar year that voters believe had the best audio description. There’s a nomination round in the spring, with a voting round in the summer. The top five films and series nominated go to the voting round, where one film and one series are then voted on again to determine who the people chose.
This year’s awards gala airs on Thursday, November 12 at 7:30pm Eastern Time. Information on where to watch in both English and Spanish will be shared around November 5. The gala will be broadcast in audio-only on ACB Media, and there will be a listening party on the ACB Community Zoom platform, followed by an after party which will be on Zoom and streamed to ACB Media.
Some have classified the ADP as an “octopus,” with many things to manage at once, and they wouldn’t necessarily be wrong. There’s a lot to keep up with, particularly when there’s a data import from a provider that has about 300 new titles… which happened recently. The pre-check before running an import tells me how many titles are new, and how many may be removed. One of the providers had about 300 new titles, and roughly two-thirds of them were truly new, meaning they had to be added manually. But I’ve had great people around to train me and lean on if I have any problems or questions. The volunteers make the committees I oversee run smoothly, and it’s always fun to see what everyone’s up to in their various spaces. I was nervous about doing a good job when I was first hired, but I have a great team and I feel confident. I think it also helps that I genuinely enjoy what I do. Here’s to continuing to broaden audio description access and awareness.
BSCB Contact Information
Phone: (773) 572-6312
BSCB website: https://acbofma.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ACBOfMA/