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Editor's Note: This story has been edited to factual correct errors.
The top North Texas employer for people who are blind and visually impaired recently moved to town.
Envision Dallas plans to put the abandoned AT&T call center on Valley View Lane to use, filling 100 chairs with blind or visually impaired call center agents, as well as continue its accessible manufacturing operation, which also employs people who are blind and visually impaired.
The organization’s goal with the 210,000-square-foot building is to open an early childhood development center, feature an art studio for events and classes for people who are blind or visually impaired and host assistive technology labs.
A non-profit organization for the blind and visually impaired, Envision acquired the old AT&T call enter off of Valley View Lane in 2021, which has been empty for nearly a decade.
Envision was founded in 1933, in Wichita, Kan., and has grown quickly in the North Texas area since acquiring and beginning a relationship with the Dallas Lighthouse for the Blind in 2018. This created Envision Dallas, which began operations in 2020, on Capitol Avenue in Dallas.
Envision acquired the Dallas Lighthouse for the Blind and began using it to create jobs that addressed the gap in employment for people with vision loss. They achieved this by adhering to the state and federal business regulations that govern employing people with vision loss.
Envision Dallas experienced rapid growth because they were the only organization in North Texas that did what they did, said Blake Lindsay, outreach manager for Envision Dallas. The demand for jobs keeps growing, so Envision purchased the former AT&T call center so the organization could continue to expand.
“(We are) the number one employer (in North Texas) for people who are blind or visually impaired,” Lindsay said.
The former call center is more than double the size of the previous location ,and this new location is more central for employees, he said.
“We serve 11 counties,” Lindsay said. “Mainly Dallas and Collin county, and a little bit of Denton County.”
The majority of employees are local, so the organization is more centrally located now than it ever has been, Lindsay said.
Since moving into the AT&T call center on Wednesday, May 1, Envision focused on settling in.
“We were running out of room on Capitol Avenue,” Lindsay said.
The workforce of about 180 employees consists of 51 percent of employees who have lost their vision, said Holly Herring, marketing manager for Envision Inc.
“We have no turnover,” Dan Carlson, the Strategic Business Development Manager for Envision Dallas, said. “Seventy-five percent of our workforce has to be visually impaired.”
“We want to be employed just like anyone else,” Keela Alonzo, an Assembler Level 2, sewing, said. “It will be three years in October.”
Keela Alonzo, like many employees, began working for Envision Dallas at the old location on Capitol Avenue, but views the move to Farmers Branch optimistically.
“We used to have a smaller building,” Keela Alonzo said. “There’s lots of room for growth here.”
“We have two and a half times the space to grow into,” Lindsay said.
However, the larger building could prove to be a struggle for employees who are blind or visually impaired.
“The size is scary because you can get lost,” Keela Alonzo said, explaining it happened to her while she was adjusting to the move. “It was overwhelming.”
Envision Dallas provides sighted employees and volunteers to help all employees who are visually impaired for eight weeks as they become oriented with the new building, Herring said.
There were not enough parking spaces for the call center to function properly for AT&T, so the building stood abandoned for a decade, Lindsay said. However, since a majority of Envision Dallas's employees are blind or visually impaired, the lack of parking space makes this a perfect fit.
After sitting unoccupied for more than a decade, the call center was in poor shape, which prompted reconstruction. Now, it’s like a brand new space, Lindsay said.
Envision Dallas has a to-do list of exciting things they plan to bring to Farmers Branch, as well as the community of blind and visually impaired people.
According to Lindsay, they plan to open up an Early Childhood Development Center (ECDC) in 2025. The classroom will attempt to consist of children that are 50 percent blind, which is similar to the school he attended in childhood, Lindsay said.
Also on that to-do list is to finish construction of Esther’s Place, a make-shift apartment outfitted with gadgets and items that improve the ease of use for many daily items that sighted people operate easily.
It makes Envision a one-stop shop for solutions to regain independence when experiencing sight loss, Lindsay explained.
“We have proven solutions that we can customize for each individual,” he said.
Esther’s Place has proven beneficial for Envision Dallas’ primary outreach program, Serving our Seniors (SOS).
“For some people a loss of sight may occur later in life,” Lindsay said. “Esther’s Place, our apartment, is set up in a way to show people what is available to them.”
The SOS program can be life changing because those that come in, come out having regained their independence.
“They come out completely changed and refreshed,” Lindsay said. “It changes their life because they really thought they were going to lose their independence, but they don’t have to.”
On top of this, Envision Dallas is resuming its arts program in August.
“It’s incredibly fun to learn how to sculpt… because you do it with feeling,” Lindsay said. “When we open up our new art program, we are going to have an exhibit hall and art gallery right here in North Texas for the visually impaired. There’s not one available here (in Dallas).”
Envision Dallas has many professionals who have been certified by the State of Texas to teach the visually impaired. Those instructors work out of the Assistive Technology Lab inside the Vision Rehabilitation Center.
“We teach them how to use the computer, so that they can email and text,” Lindsay said.
Assistive Technology Trainer Edward Alonzo is a savant when it comes to navigating Apple’s Voice Over feature.
“I work one-on-one with my clients,” Alonzo said. “I teach it all - Mac and Windows.”
The iOS feature called voice over, which is not the same as Siri, allows a person to navigate their entire device with their voice. It’s one feature that Steve Jobs ensured was available in his devices.
“Steve Jobs wanted us to all enjoy (Apple products), no matter the disability,” Lindsay said.
Edward Alonzo said he begins working with individuals by first giving them an assessment because most of the information they are learning is brand new.
“The speech is our beacon - that’s our sensory, the cane is leading,” Edward Alonzo said. "I quell the fears and teach them that, yes, you can still do those things. Is it the same way? No, but you get the ability to navigate the computer differently.”
