Riding `Road to Freedom’ bus
By Herb Drill
Congress is already on the Democratic Agenda Highway, with a pit stop at the minimum wage. Jim Ward, CEO of www.ADAWatch.org, wants an overnight stay at the ADA Restoration Act.
On Sept.29, 2006,
U.S.
House of Representatives Judiciary Committee Chairman F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R-Wis., judiciary.house.gov) and House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) introduced legislation that would restore protection for disabled Americans under the
ADA
. Their H.R. 6258 is titled the “Americans with Disabilities Act Restoration Act of 2006.”
Where does your road to freedom - socioeconomic accessibility - lead?
Does it wind along the interstate highways to Capitol Hill and the federal courts to watch disability legislation progress (regress? Is it a more personal journey, vis-a-vis what the late renowned psychotherapist Viktor> Frankl termed “self-actualization”? Has the
ADA
helped pave the way for a better life for you, had no affect in your world, or made the bumps bumpier? Do you believe the courts have dissipated the federal
ADA
to the point where an ADA Restoration Act is in order? Ward thinks so.
In his keynote address at the World Congress on Disabilities and Expo (www.wcdexpo.com) at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia, disability rights advocate Ward traveled “The Road to Freedom: Keeping the Promise of the ADA.” The year-long awareness campaign and 35,000-mile cross-country tour hit the asphalt in
Washington
on Nov. 15. It made a stop at WCD and Ward focused on the ongoing need for equal access to healthcare, transportation, education, and employment, and is determined to expose mainstream audiences to the
ADA
and the history of the disability rights movement.
Ward says that when he was “diagnosed with attention deficit disorders, I realized how people with mobility challenges and all other disabilities are put in a box” and generally disregarded. “At that point, I decided to fight for people with all types of disabilities.”
He contends the
ADA
owes “its birthright not to any one person, or any few, but to the many thousands of people who make up the disability rights movement - people who have worked for years doing whatever they could for a cause they believed in.”
Ward and his entourage left
Washington
to travel the
U.S.
and relate the “compelling history” of the movement. He says the journey didn’t end with the signing at the White House in 1990, “instead citizen action highlights the need for participation to respond to the current status of an
ADA
“severely weakened in the courts.” He said the “still unfulfilled vision” of the
ADA
reflects “segregation of children and adults with disabilities [and] disproportionately high unemployment and poverty rates.”
Ward is the founder/president of www.ADAWatch.org and the National Coalition for Disability Rights (NCDR) based in
Washington
. He said ADA Watch/NCDR is an alliance of hundreds of disability, civil rights, and social justice organizations united to promote educational and economic opportunity for children and adults with physical, mental, cognitive, and developmental disabilities. Coalition partners include the National Spinal Cord Injury Association, Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation, National Organization on Disability, Paralyzed Veterans of
America
, Easter Seals, United Cerebral Palsy, ADAPT Epilepsy Foundation, and many others.
Despite his challenges, Ward has extensive experience in public affairs and has been featured in, among other publications, the New York Times,
Washington
Post, The Wall Street Journal,
Los Angeles
Times,
Boston
Globe. He began disability work in 1979 with the Arc of Sullivan County (NY), including the infamous
Willowbrook
State
School
, the catalyst for one of the first protection and advocacy laws for people with disabilities. He had been director of public policy for the National Association of Protection and Advocacy Systems, the network of federally-mandated disability law centers now called the National Disability Rights Network (NDRN). He graduated from the State University of New York/Albany, holds a master’s degree in clinical social work from
Adelphi
University
and interned for the
Veterans
Administration
Hospital
in White River Junction,
Vt.
As a wellness consultant, he has served corporations including GE,
IBM
, and Goodrich.
The tour’s traveling staff - “actually living and working on the road,” Ward explained - includes:
* Debbie Fletter Ward, former vice president/member education and online marketing for
AOL
, and its first director of accessibility. She founded Wired on Wheels Inc., a nonprofit Web directory of accessible businesses and has a bachelor’s degree from the University of California/Berkeley and a master’s degree from the
University
of
Maryland
.
* Tom Olin, social documentarian and photojournalist, is the director of the
Disability
Rights
Center
. For 25 years, he has put the movement on film, beginning in
Los Angeles
, where he photographed one of the nation’s first demonstrations calling for the creation of curb cuts. Olin’s photos were selected to be part of the Smithsonian Institution’s
ADA
exhibit.
* Bobby Coward is the co-founder and director of DIRECT Action (Disabled Individuals for Real Empowerment and Community Training) and the chair/spokesperson of Capital Area ADAPT (American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today). He is a U.S. Air Force veteran with quadriplegia resulting from a spinal cord injury in an auto accident. Coward has since promoted independent living options for people with disabilities.
* Russ Holt is the founder/president of Access Information Inc. Partially paralyzed in an auto accident; Holt has become an advocate for people with disabilities. He graduated from
American
University
and was featured in a Dateline NBC episode entitled, "No Way In." He showed, by wearing a hidden camera, how some employers were discriminating against applicants with disabilities.
Ward contends the
ADA
began a long time ago “in
U.S.
cities and towns when people with disabilities began to challenge societal barriers that excluded them from their communities, and when parents of children with disabilities began to fight against the exclusion and segregation of their children. Children with disabilities routinely are denied admission into childcare, voucher programs and charter schools. Archaic healthcare regulations still force people with disabilities out of their homes and communities and into isolated and often abusive nursing facilities and institutions. The unemployment rate of people with disabilities is up to 70%; the poverty rate twice that of people with no disabilities. Like the African-Americans who sat in at segregated lunch counters and refused to move to the back of the bus, people with disabilities sat in federal buildings, obstructed the movement of inaccessible buses, and marched through the streets to protest injustice. Like the civil rights movements before it, the disability rights movement sought justice in the courts and Congress.”
His campaign was inspired by the journey of Justin and Yoshiko Dart to mobilize support for passage of the
ADA
, Ward said. “We hope to mobilize Americans to keep the promise of the
ADA
: freedom, inclusion, and opportunity for children and adults with physical, mental, cognitive, and developmental disabilities. We plan press conferences, radio shows, and TV interviews highlighting the obstacles and the victories of Americans with disabilities. We’ll demonstrate technology that is advancing educational and economic opportunities for people with disabilities, with help from the Assistive Technology Industry Association (ATIA).”
Ward emphasizes there are several simple things you can do right now to get on the road to freedom, and help the
ADA
reach its potential:
* “You can sign a petition in person if you see us on tour, or go to www.roadtofreedom.org.”
* “Contact Congress, it’s not as hard as it sounds. Go to www.roadtofreedom.org. We will provide you with the facts you need and contact information.”
* Sign up for news and alerts. An educated community is an empowered community. “Sign up at our site, and we’ll keep you up-to-date on the difference you are making.”
* If you are a person with a disability, a family member, an advocate - or just someone who cares about people with disabilities - there are organizations that need your support. Find out about state and local partners at www.ncdr.org. You provide financial support for advocacy work for children and adults with physical, mental, cognitive, and developmental disabilities.
Ward added: “The Road to Freedom is a call to action for people with disabilities, family members, teachers, advocates, and all Americans committed to freedom, inclusion, and opportunity.”
