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Letters to the Editor and Opeds
ILC Editorial Responses to news appearing in state newspapers
2006
January 23, 2006, Sacramento Bee
Focusing on access rights
Marjie Lundstrom's recent columns forgot to tell one side of the story: These businesses aren't being compliant with the law. The best way to avoid lawsuits is to be accessible. Perhaps a few people have been more vigilant in getting businesses to comply. But for every one of those, there are thousands who are denied access.
Perhaps there have been abuses of the law. Yet, the legislative solutions that have been proposed in the past by Sen. Charles Poochigian and Assemblyman Tim Leslie do not bring more access, but give a free pass to businesses that are disobeying the law.
Businesses say they are not aware of their obligations under the ADA. The proper solution focuses on having building inspectors, the chamber of commerce, business licensing officials, etc., informing those businesses what they need to do to be compliant, not denying civil rights.
- Vince Wetzel, Sacramento
Deputy Director, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
January 12, 2006, San Francisco Chronicle
Paper trail not enough
Editor -- The Chronicle's story on the new paper trail requirement for e-voting ("Paper Trail law for e-voting has fans, foes," Jan. 10) misses one very key component; paper trails make all voting systems inaccessible for people with disabilities.
Requiring a paper trail and making that the official ballot in recounts removes the ability of a person who is blind the ability to verify his or her vote. Further, adding cumbersome printers makes curbside voting virtually impossible for those who are unable to go inside the polling place. By making this paper-trail requirement, the state is now in violation of the Help America Vote Act's disability provisions.
The disability community wants a private, independent, accessible and secure vote. With the addition of a paper trail, California's voting systems fail.
VINCE WETZEL, deputy director
California Foundation for Independent Living Centers, Inc.
2005
October 31, 2005, Sacramento Bee
Disabled access to polls
Re "Disabled access to polls improves," Oct. 20: The story on the accessibility of the Automark voting machine didn't report the entire story.
Although people with visual impairments will have greater privacy, voters who have limited or no use of their hands will still not have a private vote.
The Automark system requires the voters to insert their ballots into the machine, remove them and then insert them into the vote-counting scanner. People with manual dexterity limitations will need assistance and their privacy will be compromised.
If The Bee had talked to any disability organizations, the article might have included these arguments. Instead, The Bee took the word of the vendor and the registrar of voters.
The Automark isn't the "Golden Child" it has been made out to be.
- Patricia Yeager, Sacramento
Executive Director, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
October 13, 2005, Sacramento Bee
Rights in nursing homes
I am appalled, but not surprised, to read that nursing home violations are rampant. Nursing home owners may say the solution is money; disability advocates have different ideas.
The Supreme Court's Olmstead decision requires that, where possible, people have the choice to live in the community rather than institutions. California has done little to increase community options for people with disabilities.
Those who are in nursing homes need rights. Sen. Elaine Alquist, D-San Jose, introduced SB 526 to provide residents' rights to people in nursing homes. That bill is a two-year bill because legislators were not troubled enough by nursing home abuses. This article should increase legislative outrage and SB 526 support.
If nursing homes are not the safe havens that families believe them to be, then Californians should be demanding home and community-based services.
- Cheryl Bergan, Sacramento
Public policy analyst, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
August 22, 2005, Sacramento Bee
Medi-Cal nursing home bias
Re "Ruling restricts Medi-Cal lawsuits," Aug. 4: There is an institutional bias that says that we'll pay whatever it takes to keep you in an expensive and outmoded nursing home, yet if you want to live in the community you must get a waiver. Isn't this reverse logic?
Most people want to live in the community at a lower cost to Medi-Cal. So shouldn't you need a waiver to get into a nursing home? The U.S. Supreme Court said in its 1999 Olmstead decision that people with disabilities deserve to live in the most integrated setting possible. The 9th Circuit has given the state an out to delay implementing the ruling.
Let's hope that the Schwarzenegger administration doesn't use the out and moves toward creating a comprehensive and speedy plan to move people out of nursing homes and into the community.
- Vince Wetzel, Sacramento
Deputy Director, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
August 21, 2005, Los Angeles Times
Noncompliance Is Why Businesses Are Sued
Re: Suit Targets Access for the Disabled at Taco Bell (Aug. 15);
It is good to finally see a story that takes a balanced view of access lawsuits. For more than a year, across this state, the focus has taken the side of the "poor business who is being sued" instead of looking at the reasons the business has been sued - non-compliance of state and federal access laws. The ADA recently celebrated its 15th birthday, yet many businesses still plead ignorance to their knowledge of the law as an excuse for their noncompliance. Instead of fighting for legislation that rewards noncompliance, businesses should work on real solutions such as perhaps access inspections similar to home inspections to educate businesses on their compliance issues. Perhaps this way we can limit lawsuits the right way, with more compliant businesses.
Vince Wetzel
Deputy Director
California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
June 26, 2005, Sacramento Bee
Paying for in-home care
Although The Bee has done extensive stories on the In-Home Supportive Services program, its June 19 editorial "Battle of the budget" showed a lack of foresight and common sense with regards to the program.
In-home care provides necessary services to low-income people with disabilities and seniors that allows them to live independently in their own homes. While it is easy to ask counties to pick up more of the costs for wages, the reality is that the difference won't be made up. For one, counties have negotiated in good faith these wages based on what the law and the state has told them with regards to funding. As well, counties have clauses in their collective bargaining agreements that allow them to opt out when state funding for wages is reduced. Finally, counties are cash-strapped as it is. Asking them to pick up another cost is unrealistic.
- Vince Wetzel, Sacramento
Deputy Director, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
May 20, 2005, Sacramento Bee
Following ADA rules
The real-world problem is not that small businesses are being sued, as Dan Walters suggests in his May 9 column, but that small businesses do not follow state and federal laws related to access ("Lawsuit dilemma redux: Once again, a real-world problem ignored").SB 855 would never have increased access. Instead, it would have required that for each and every access violation, for all size businesses (a fact generally ignored by proponents of this type of legislation), a business would have to receive a letter, formally identifying access issues by code. A person with a disability would be forced to hire a lawyer just to say, "Your bathroom is too narrow," increasing litigation costs. And a business wouldn't be required to comply for 150 days after it received such notice, which would remove all incentive to comply with existing access laws until they are noticed.
- Teresa Favuzzi, Sacramento
April 17, 2005, Los Angeles Times
End-of-Life Bill Is the Wrong Solution
Re: Legislators to Take Up End-of-Life Measure, April 11: As we have seen with Terri Schiavo, end-of-life issues can be complicated, difficult and often heart-wrenching. It is understandable that people who need end-of-life care want the choice to die on their own terms.
However, given the state of affairs in our healthcare system, with reductions to Medicaid and Medicare, along with the profit-driven HMOs, state Assembly Bill 654 is the wrong solution.
People with disabilities know firsthand the failures of our healthcare system. The difficulties in finding the right type of care can make people with disabilities feel as though they are a burden to loved ones, themselves and society. We cannot let assisted suicide allow our healthcare system to define the way we should die. Rather, we should fight for better end-of-life care that cherishes life on a person's own terms.
Vince Wetzel
Director of External Communications
California Foundation for Indpendent Living Centers
Sacramento, CA
March 23, 2005, North County Times
The Schiavo case: The future of my people
By Christina Mills
Terri Schiavo deserves to live! Rage and fear keeps passing through my mind hour after hour. I can't stop thinking about Terri and how her life, one human life that has captured the attention of all three branches of government, is going to ultimately impact the future of people with disabilities.
It reminds me of what my friend said the other day: "Disability is a political issue, quality of life is a personal issue." I keep asking myself, "How did we get to this point?" Do the countless hours of advocacy that the disability community has done for years and even generations mean nothing? Has the Not Dead Yet campaign gone nowhere? Is the current situation showing us, people with disabilities, that our opinion and personal life experiences are meaningless? It's bad enough that generations to come are already being doomed by abortion.
(Link to rest of oped)
March 17, 2005, San Francisco Chronicle
On Assisted Suicide: Film should focus on living with a disability
By Vince Wetzel
The Academy Awards and portrayal of people with disabilities have always gone hand-in-hand. When movies from "My Left Foot" to "Rain Man" to "A Beautiful Mind" portray the dramatic elements of disabilities, good and bad, their chances for gaining Oscar recognition are often increased.
Late last month, the Motion Picture Academy lauded "Million Dollar Baby" with four Oscars, including those for best picture and best director, while the "Sea Inside" took home the award for best foreign film. Unlike past films that raised awareness of disabilities however, "Million Dollar Baby" and "The Sea Inside" are dangerously close to becoming propaganda for assisted suicide.
(Link to rest of oped)
March 1, 2005, San Francisco Chronicle
Disabling the ADA, one nominee at a time
By Herb Levine
In 1990, the first President George Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act and proclaimed, ?Let the shameful wall of exclusion finally come tumbling down.?
Fifteen years later, George W. Bush is apparently rebuilding that wall by undermining the ADA through judicial appointments. Bush is nominating judges that are outspoken, if not radical activists, in their opposition to the ADA and the protections for people with disabilities. In an ironic Republican twist, if these judges had their way, civil rights for people with disabilities would regress, prohibiting full participation in society and putting more people with disabilities on the public dole.
(Link to rest of oped)
Feb. 20, 2005, Long Beach Press Telegram
Long Beach needs homes everybody can afford
By Josh Butler
Take skyrocketing home prices and apartment rents and a 3.7 percent vacancy rate (the lowest in Los Angeles County during 2004), add a Housing Action Plan that misses 26,000 of the neediest families, combine that with cuts to housing programs at the federal and state levels and you couldn't have a better recipe for a housing crisis. That's why Long Beach needs to adopt a Housing Trust Fund.
The Housing Trust Fund will allow Long Beach to take responsibility for ensuring the needs of its own residents without having to rely on funding from the state and federal government, which is rapidly dwindling. The Housing Trust Fund will allow Long Beach to build homes and apartments that all of its residents can afford, while addressing our low vacancy rates and skyrocketing housing costs by increasing housing production. It also can fill the gap that exists in the city's Housing Action Plan, as well as the private market ? neither build homes or apartments for the city's neediest residents, the extremely low income.
(link to rest of oped)
Feb, 14, 2005, SacramentoBee
Lengthy delay in justice
Re Judge tries to rein in serial litigant's 'extortion' under disability law, Jan. 20: Marjie Lundstrom says in her column regarding litigation under the Americans with Disabilities Act, How simple it would be if \ Molski had given him 90 days to fix the problem - just 90 days.Doesn't she mean 13 years and 90 days, since the Americans with Disabilities Act was enacted in 1990 and the violation occurred in 2003?
Cheryl Bergan, Sacramento
Feb. 14, 2005, SacramentoBee
The choice to live
Re 2 lawmakers plan assisted-suicide bill, Feb. 5: People with disabilities know how difficult it is to get needed health care. We know that the medical community makes horrendous mistakes in regard to our lives based on limited views of quality of life.Shall we talk about the 22-year-old quadriplegic who was urged to sign a do not resuscitate order and called an independent living center screaming that he was 22 and he didn't want to die?
This assisted-suicide bill is about value, and medical and economic pressure, both on society and on individual families. With that kind of pressure, what sounds like a choice is moderated by all kinds of ideas about what dignity is and what society thinks about people with disabilities (which is not much).
Choice is about ensuring that the dying get what they need, that pain is moderated and dignity is redefined as an interior trait, not the loss of bodily control.
Choosing death isn't a fair choice until people with disabilities are valued and health care is not predicated on the dollar. Until then, we choose life.
Patricia Yeager, Sacramento
Director, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
February 13, 2005, Orange County Register
Too Many businesses ignore law
By Vince Wetzel
In a recent column in the Register regarding access violations [?Extortion in the marketpace,? California Focus, Feb. 7], Assemblymember Tim Leslie forgot to mention one main point: Most businesses that are sued for Americans with Disabilities Act and other access law violations are not obeying the law. And his legislation (AB 20) would solidify a loophole for businesses to circumvent the law.
No matter how many times people complain about frivolous lawsuits or unscrupulous lawyers, the fact remains that people with disabilities are not able to patronize businesses because they are turned away.
(Link to entire oped)
2004
December 13, 2004, Los Angeles Times
Assistive Technology
?Giving the Blind a Better Picture of Film Action,?Dec. 6.
Kudos to the Center for Partially Sighted, the Sight and Sound Foundation and describedmedia.com for the event that allowed people with visual impairments to experience the joy of the movies. Assistive technology devices dramatically change people's lives and allow them to do things they normally wouldn't dream of.
Assistive technology tools and resources used on a daily basis by millions of people with disabilities helps people with disabilities improve the quality of life. They can be as simple as modified eating utensils. There are many resources in finding assistive technology, including the AT Network ([800] 390-2699, TTY [800] 900-0706, atnet.org), which provides free information and referrals.
Jennifer Mansfield
Marketing Coordinator
AT Network
Sacramento
July 30, 2004, Sacramento Bee
Legislative mischief
Re End of session brings usual complaints about sneaky bills, Aug. 23: We don't love gut-and-amend bills like AB 1629. This particular bill cropped up in several articles on what is wrong with gutting and amending, including Dan Walters' column.The bill purports to provide wage increases to nursing home staff. The bill actually caps wage increases of front-line staff without assuring any increases. The bill guarantees nursing homes a profit.
Guaranteeing a profit to a for-profit entity in a poorly regulated industry that retains the right to reject patients and can sell out at a moment's notice is folly. It's like getting the perks of guaranteed profit, without the responsibility of regulations.
This bill is on faster than fast track. The only individuals who have put a dollar figure to this bill are, oddly enough, the sponsors of the bill. Opposing this bill might feel dangerous to legislators. Obviously nursing homes need improvement. Everybody says so. But supporting a bill that will not improve quality, that sets precedent and that has not been analyzed for financial ramifications feels far more dangerous to us. It feels like what happened with the prison guards contracts.
Cheryl Bergan, Sacramento
Public Policy Analyst, California Foundation for Independent Living Centers
April 11, 2004, Modesto Bee
Cutting into necessities
Regarding Delays frustrate disabled (April 7, Page B-1): If the services to the disabled are cut, as proposed by the governor in January, we will have millions of people with disabilities, like Audrey, without needed services such as Medi-Cal and In Home Supportive Services in California.
These services aren't a luxury, like flying first class to Hawaii. These are necessary and life-saving services needed by people with disabilities so that we can be active in our community and have a measure of independence like everyone else in our society.
Statistics repeatedly prove that it costs five to seven times more for the disabled to be institutionalized than to receive services in their own home.
Our governor needs to understand that his proposed cuts to the poor and disabled will put our state in a deeper hole in the near future and deny us our freedom and independence.
JOHN KIRBY
Disability Resource Agency
Modesto
Feb. 13, 2004, San Francisco Chronicle
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Accessibility
Editor -- In response to History being designed anew (Feb. 10): While we applaud San Francisco for addressing the issue of accessibility in the supervisors' chambers, does the city really need to wait until there is a clear-and-present need? Are all services in the mental health, substance abuse and shelter systems accessible to all San Franciscans?
The rest of city government can take a lead from the Mayor's Office on Disability. It is staffed by knowledgeable professionals with disabilities, all committed to a fully accessible.
San Francisco .
HERB LEVINE
Executive Director
Independent Living Resource Center
San Francisco
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