Deaf Town in America and Israel

Printed in the Olathe News in September, 2007

Deaf Town in America and Israel
By Leonard Hall

During my two week vacation trip to Yellowstone, I stopped at a farmland tract where a deaf town was proposed next to I-90 near Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

The name of the deaf town was Laurent. Several deaf people have been working for years in advocating and preparing plans for the deaf town.

The site is a beautiful tract of approximately 160 acres with a real estate sign that had been painted over.

Like Kansas, many towns in South Dakota have lost almost all of their population and became ghost towns. It was a rare event for anyone to propose a new town.

The grand plan for the deaf town attracted a lot of attention. Over 150 deaf individuals signed a list expressing their desire to buy or rent property in the new deaf town.

Nearby was the county seat town of Salem where numerous public hearings were held before the planning and county boards about the proposed plan for the deaf town.

The public hearings raised a number of questions about whether the deaf town can be built and what kind of public services are needed.

There is a large deaf population in the general area as Communication Services for the Deaf (CSD) grew in Sioux Falls from a small operation to an outstanding nationwide service organization with many hundreds of employees.

Over the past several years due to the changing regulatory environment and competition, CSD lost a significant number of employees, so the deaf population has gotten smaller.

Like the painted-over real estate sign on the farmland, there had been no news about the proposed deaf town over the past year. The dream may be fading.

In the desert of Negev in Israel, there is a community called Al-Sayyid, where 3,500 Bedouin from an Arab nomadic tribe live. At least 150 residents are deaf.

Apparently through large families and genetic probabilities, a high number of deaf children were born in Al-Sayyid. Nearly all of the village’s residents, including hearing and deaf people, are fluent in sign language.

It may be the only place in the entire world that can be referred to as a deaf town where everyone can communicate in sign language.

The last true deaf town in America was Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts in the 1800s, which had many deaf residents due to marriages among cousins and large families. This deaf community has disappeared.

The dream of living in a deaf town will continue among the many deaf people living in America.

(Leonard Hall writes a weekly column for the Olathe News. He can be reached at Legalnetwk@aol.com.)