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Arizona county battles over blind vendors law.

Mohave County in Arizona is currently embroiled in a conflict over a law that requires the country to hire blind vendors to operate county vending machines.

May 19, 2015

Mohave County in Arizona is embroiled in a legal battle over a law that requires counties to use blind business owners to stock and maintain vending machines in county buildings. The fight began earlier this month when county supervisors were called to renew a contract with the Department of Economic Security to continue the blind program, according to a report by Today's News-Herald

Some country supervisors considered the agreement to be unfair and against the fine print of the law. "It says 'priority,' which doesn’t mean they are getting an automatic contract," supervisor Steve Moss said in the meeting. “Priority means you are first up, it doesn’t mean you are guaranteed to get the job."

Mohave's procurement director Annie Newton-Fruhwirth informed the supervisors that refusing the agreement would be against the blind vendors' law. In addition, the manager of the program, James Sauer said the county should either use the blind business owners or get rid of the vending machines altogether.