Fashion: Designer Helps the Blind, Disabled

Designer Karl Kani (“Clothes Make the Man,” Dec. 4), has used his success to help us at the Foundation for the Junior Blind as a caring and credible mentor to sighted inner-city teens in our First Steps Youth Enrichment Program. The foundation created First Steps in 1992 as a commitment to Los Angeles, going beyond our work with the blind, visually impaired and multi-disabled blind population.

Kani hosted our 1994 class in his offices and told them his story and observations firsthand, which expanded the teens’ worlds and gave greater relevance to our ongoing First Steps program of providing jobs, teaching life skills and developing the self-esteem needed to define and pursue life goals.

ROBERT B. RALLS

President, Foundation for the Junior Blind