Page 3 - Sonoma County Gazette April 2017

Villainizing the Victims
who still find it necessary to take businesses to court, and to instead ask why, after all these decades, too many businesses persist in discriminating against people with disabilities. And, we need to ask ourselves why more people don’t question the media’s biased reporting.
It’s understandable that Sandy Metzger wants to defend her son, owner of the Rio Nido Roadhouse but appealing to the Court of Public Opinion with her version of the facts does not address the issues I brought to the attention of the Gazette readers last month - that lashing out at people with disabilities who are forced to go to court to have their civil rights enforced does a disservice to everyone. (Disability is equal opportunity.)
In respond to Ms. Metger’s attempts to shame me publicly, I have to say that I haven’t filed 100s of law suits, but I should have. That would mean that thousands of people with disabilities would not have to experience the humiliation and damage of exclusion.
The issue, as I pointed out, is not that there are law suits brought against businesses because of their architectural barriers, but, rather, that almost a half century after state laws were passed requiring business to be accessible to everyone, and more than a quarter century after the ADA required businesses to remove their barriers and congress provided a tax credit for barrier removal, these state and Federal laws are still being violated.
In addition, I want to respond to Ms. Metzger that I am proud of my friendship with Richard Skaff and the non-profit charitable organization, Designing Accessible Communities (DAC) which he founded. Since the 90s, he and I have sat on numerous state, Federal and national access advisory committees, donating thousands of volunteer hours to help create a built environment that includes everyone. Richard, other access experts and I have provided hundreds of seminars for enforcing authorities, businesses, architects, builders and others, including organizations of people with
That is the issue, and it’s one of attitude. It’s obvious that it’s impossible to remove bigotry and prejudice with the stroke of a pen. However, it would help if we demand that the media stop blaming people with disabilities
LETTERS cont’d on page 4
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