Ada

On Thursday, April 8, 2004, MRS. ADA VIRGINIA La PLANTE BURNS, 78, of Florida, formerly of Demascus, MD, at Cypress Village Nursing Home in Jacksonville, FL. Born April 11, 1925, in Baltimore, MD, she was the daughter of the late Alfred La Plante and Virginia Mc Bride Mercer. She retired after 28 years with the State Department of Assessments and Taxation, Montgomery County Government. She was a past president and member of the Damascus American Legion Auxiliary Post 171. She was a member of the Wesley Grove United Methodist Church in Woodfield, MD. She enjoyed cooking, playing scrabble and crosswords puzzles.

BOSTON -- This morning, I am once again among the temporarily abled. I have achieved this enviable state as I do each day, by inserting one lens into my right eye and the other into my left.The world is now in focus. I can go about my daily business, drive to work, write this column and read a newspaper.Let me say that the phrase "temporarily abled" has long made me grit my teeth. The term suggests that the permanent human condition is disabled. It trivializes the great divide.Nevertheless, the phrase comes to my mind every time I see a young person hobbling around in a cast or an older person in a wheelchair.

Ada Becker, a former Baltimore fashion model and clothier, died Thursday at North Oaks Retirement Community in Pikesville of complications from a fractured hip. She was 89. Ada Gorelik grew up in Baltimore, the eldest of three girls and the piano player of the group. "She played quite well. Our [middle] sister Ruth used to dance and I used to do the singing," said Lillian Hack, the youngest of the trio. "We used to go out and entertain different organizations, not to be paid, just because we enjoyed it."

Victor Breehne thought he had a job with Black & Decker Corp. all sewn up. He said the Towson-based power tools manufacturer made him an offer. All he had to do was pass a medical exam. But Breehne alleges the offer was rescinded because he flunked a "nerve conduction study" the company uses to predict if a person is likely to develop carpal tunnel syndrome, an often-disabling wrist and hand injury caused by repetitive motion. He has filed a class action suit in federal court in Tennessee, claiming the company violated the Americans with Disabilities Act. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has challenged the use of such tests, which aren't uncommon in manufacturing settings, on ADA grounds.

It's a brave new world in the barnyard. Cloned cows are becoming commonplace just five years after scientists created the first one, a Holstein steer named Gene. A handsome black-and-white Holstein heifer, created from a few cells scraped out of a champion's ear, sold for a mere $31,000 in Westminster yesterday. A Midwestern milk cow syndicate bought her, paying more than 10 times the going price for a fairly good milk cow. But the unromantically named Ada 3-ETN went for far less than the first commercially available Holstein clones, which sold at national auctions a little more than a year ago. Spotlights, smoke machines and other hoopla surrounded those clones, which sold before they were born for $80,000 to $100,000.

A class action lawsuit filed yesterday in Baltimore Circuit Court alleges that the American Dental Association and the Maryland State Dental Association are "engaging in fraud" by not telling consumers that amalgam fillings contain about 50 percent mercury. The suit, similar to two filed last year in California, accuses the groups of deceiving Marylanders, and says mercury poses "substantial health risks" to certain users. The ADA says amalgam fillings are safe and have restored the teeth of more than 100 million Americans in the past 150 years.

Joseph L. Rauh Jr., 81, a prominent lawyer and founder of Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) who often championed civil liberties causes, died Thursday night in a Washington hospital after suffering a massive heart attack. In 1946, he was one of a small group of people who proposed the anti-Communist but liberal organization that became the ADA. The Harvard-trained lawyer was the ADA national chairman from 1955 to 1957 and was on the executive board of the NAACP. In addition, he was the partner of Clarence Mitchell when the two served as co-chairmen of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights.

WASHINGTON - When President George H. W. Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990, he said this landmark law would enable everyone with a disability to "pass through once-closed doors into a bright new era of equality, independence and freedom." Yet by nominating Judge Terrence W. Boyle to serve on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the current President Bush threatens to shatter the legacy his father established 15 years ago. Slowly but steadily, the ADA is helping to remove the obstacles - both physical and attitudinal - that have denied people with disabilities access to the American dream.

WHO TO CALLAgencies that provide free advice on the Americans with Disabilities Act:GENERAL INFORMATIONU.S. Department of Justice ADA Hotline: (202) 514-0301. TDD: (202) 514-0381Job Accommodation Network ADA Hotline: (800) 232-9675Equal Employment Opportunity Commission: (800) 800-EEOC. Same number for TDD.Maryland Governor's Office for Handicapped Individuals: 333-3098Mid-Atlantic Disability & Business Technical Assistance Center: (800) ADA-4999. TDD: (703) 525-3268.TransCent: (301) 424-2002.

WASHINGTON -- Maryland's U.S. senators are among the most liberal in the nation, according to a survey of voting records compiled by the Americans for Democratic Action.ADA, a liberal public policy organization based in Washington, rated senators on the basis of 20 votes taken in 1991 on such topics as campaign finance reform, extension of unemployment benefits, sanctions against Iraq and the confirmation of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court.The votes were rated according to ADA's position on the issues.