ADA Malarkey

AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT OF 1990, AS AMENDED
Editor’s Note:
Following is the current text of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), including changes made by the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (P.L. 110-325), which became effective on January 1, 2009. The ADA was originally enacted in public law format and later rearranged and published in the United States Code. The United States Code is divided into titles and chapters that classify laws according to their subject matter. Titles I, II, III, and V of the original law are codified in Title 42, chapter 126, of the United States Code beginning at section 12101. Title IV of the original law is codified in Title 47, chapter 5, of the United States Code. Since this codification resulted in changes in the numbering system, the Table of Contents provides the section numbers of the ADA as originally enacted in brackets after the codified section numbers and headings.

The following private entities are considered public accommodations for purposes of this subchapter, if the operations of such entities affect commerce

(A) Inn Accommodations
(B) Food Accommodations
(C) Movie House
(D) Banks
(E) Grocery Store
(F) Laundromat, dry-cleaner, bank, barber shop, beauty shop, travel service, shoe repair service, funeral parlor, gas station, office of an accountant or lawyer, pharmacy, insurance office, professional office of a health care provider, hospital, or other service establishment;
(G) Travel
(H) Public Entertainment
(I) Recreation
(J) Education
(K) Day Care Center
(L) Applies to Spa Facilities

Section 12182: List of prohibitions
Sec. 12183. New construction
Sec. 12186. Regulations
Sec. 12203 Remedies
Sec. 12205. Attorney's fees (usually not allowed)
12206. Technical assistance
(c)(1) Rendering assistance (generally ignored)
(e) Failure to receive assistance (generally ignored)


In 1990, in a feeble effort to correct the discrimination against the largest minority group in the US (est. 36 million), the congress enacted a “so called” Americans with Disabilities Act as partially described above. As in most legislative enactments, the document is lengthy wordy, and full of every “loophole” known to the political analyst. In using this legislation, in an effort to correct for myself and other in the large disabilities community, the obvious discrimination against those that are disabled. ( I am a totally blind 100% disabled service connected veteran for over 40 years.) I have yet to find one public official and certainly not a private employer who has read the document.

One county manager, (New Hanover County, NC) told me (as well as another totally blind citizen Katherine Vasalao) that he had never read the legislation “and did not intend to do so”. I have brought the matter of ignorance of the intent and legality of the legislation not only to attention of the US Justice Department, but to each state senator and representative since it became law. Anytime, I have brought discrimination against the disabled to the attention of the beaurocrat in the ADA Justice Department, I get back the same, identical letter. “We advise you to employ a lawyer.”

The best example and most flagrant violation showing discrimination against disability occurred with this writer and my complaint with the local YMCA. After the death of Mr. Neworth, I was the oldest and had longest standing membership of the local YMCA. (A member since its location at 3rd and market) Although totally blind, my driver would park my car in front of the facility each day and wait for me in the car while I went in for a one hour workout. Nothing was given to me as far as fees. I paid the same as everyone else. Nothing was given to me as far as special attention. My locker was always put at the most inconvenient place. The security system on the upper door required vision because it had a dial code system for admission. I would stand and beat on the door with my white cane until some member came and opened the door. I believe the attendant would testify that he was instructed to discourage handicapped members from attending.

Since the men’s locker room was upstairs, I had to maneuver not only hallways but stairs. The UPS and other delivery people such as Pepsi/Gatorade always put their deliveries at the bottom of the steps; convenient for a blind handicapped person to fall over. I am still suffering from falls in hallways in the facility.

Finally, after years of this inhumane treatment which the employees were well aware. I left the facility and made a further complaint to the ADA about the discrimination at this public facility which uses public funds. (which would have the audacity to have Christian in its name, which for years discriminated against blacks and women)

Finally, a lawyer was assigned to the case, the hearing was held at a hearing facility on Cinema Drive, I asked the scheduling person if I should be represented by an attorney. She assured me that it was not a part of the legal process. Of course, I am totally blind, I could not see who was at the hearing or how many were at the hearing. All I could hear was the sounds of other people. It was the most one-sided event one could possibly imagine. The federal attorney questioned me since I was bringing the complaint and said practically nothing, ( This should be a matter of public record with ADA) to the YMCA Manager, his board of trustees, and others who were there.

The conclusion was that “they would do better with disabled citizens who come to the facility and that I WOULD SAY NOTHING TO THE LOCAL NEWS MEDIA about the hearing Since the editor of the local paper at the time, Mr. Charles Anderson, was on the board of the YMCA. You can be assured that there was nothing in the paper about the hearing and as far as I know, since I’ve never been back in the building, the same conditions are still in evidence.

The question is if the ADA legislation is not used in a situation such as this or in many others are challenged everyday, why go through the farce of an enacting such hypocrisy?

US Senator John East, wheelchair bound, former professor at East Carolina University, a friend of mine, told me on one occasion that the disabled life “is hardly worth living.“ He later killed himself, even after he was called a cripple on the floor of the US senate. You see, the capitol which has the painting of the baptism of Pocahontas in its dome which from 1799-1892 was declared a Christian nation by the US supreme court., easily discriminates against Christian disabled citizens such as Dr. East and myself.

No one has voted for me, I have not been hired by anyone, I cannot be fired by anyone for speaking my mind, but for decades I have protested the treatment of the disabled, both the average citizen who most of the time will not speak for himself and for the disabled veteran who will not speak for himself (most have told me if they say anything they are afraid they will lose their VA benefit for which their family depends). Katherine Vasaloa, before she died, blind from birth, told me she had never been able to get any funds other then what she provided herself to hire someone to go to the grocery store. I can say without fear of contradiction, and I will reach into my meager funds, to give anyone 1,000 dollars that this totally blind veteran, dictating this letter, to a person hired to take the dictation, has never received one dime from any church, civic club, or veterans group.

In the American experience, next to slavery, the greatest shame of this nation is its treatment of handicap citizens and disabled veterans. The greatest shame is the hypocrisy of a congress who would pass an Americans with disabilities act and then do nothing to enforce it.