Of course, before you park in the handicapped spaces, they check to make sure that you personally live in the area, and naturally, it’s a gated community where no one ever visits.
Curb cuts BTW, are also very useful and helpful for strollers of course.
I NEVER said it was bad. I said it (the ADA) starts out with noble intentions. It’s the end result and future ramifications that are disturbing. With most government laws and regulations once you start adding more and more mandates you begin concocting a recipe for disaster:
Take a problem that needs correction and by the time you add 1 part vague language + 2 parts overzealous bureaucrats + 40,000 employment law attorneys and trial lawyers + a few militant special interest groups and mix with a hundred or so judges whose ability to interpret law borders on the inane and what you end up with a mess on your hands.
Sure, the ADA has helped countless disabled Americans
But,
There are abuses and misinterpretations that should be alarming to everyone.
Similar to the ADA, I’m quite certain the original intent of SSI supplemental disability payments was to assist American citizens whose disabilities limited their ability to earn a living.
What have we ended up with?[ul][li]Drunks applying for benefits claiming their alcoholism is a disability.Single mothers with hyperactive broods who get school administrators to label their children as learning disabled for a fatter check.[/ul] [/li]
Anyone can say
Even if you want to pooh-pooh CATO’s intentions (market liberalism) that is a disturbing number of complaints. We’ve all read the stories about the person with dyslexia suing an employer over a job that requires reading comprehenion or the wheelchair bound bartender suing a tavern owner because the barback wasn’t accessible. I bet if you listed those 15,000 complaints from most to least ludicrous the hilariously ridiculous ones alone wouldn’t fit on this thread.
Think about it, that’s 15,000 employers, merchants and municipalities dragged through either the bureaucratic of justice system. A good percentage of which have had both their freedom abridged and their property taken while not even knowing the were non-compliant. All that in the name of noble intentions. Fairness? I think not
This isn’t a very good argument against “government laws and regulations” but is a argument for better follow-up as to how the laws are working. The US Congress has oversight committees whose task it is to do just that. Your post is a claim that they are not doing that well enough.
And, of course, it isn’t only “government” actions that start out well intentioned and go sour. Accounting is intended to keep the owner or owners, and prospective investors, of a business informed as to the financial health of the business. It turned into a way to inflate the bonuses of the high level executives when no one (the government, i.e. the representative of the rest of us) was looking.
Government laws and regulations don’t come out of the blue. They are the result of the actions of society that are perceived to be in need of modifications. Do laws as originally passed need monitoring for effect? Of course they do. Is that done? Yes, as I noted above. You claim is that that monitoring has not been done well enough.
and of course the fact that there’s certain number of idiotic complaints filed doesn’t mean that
A. the law itself is stupid, unneccesary
or
B. that there aren’t examples of egregious behavior on the part of employers.
One anecdotal story I’d been told was of a factory that refused to hire short people, because the controls on their machines were set at a certain height. After the suit, they arranged for portable stands for shorter people to stand on. Again, most of the accomodations that have been requested had very little financial cost to the employer. Why on earth did it take having a law so that employers would spend that small amount of money to allow some one to do their job? (taking into account that according to the data, most of the accomodations were for current employees). The cost of rehiring, training new staff is much, much more than the $500 average cost (taking the hirer cost). Hell, the last time I ran a want ad, the ad alone cost me about $100.
Another suit, [size](Size 30-XS?)[/size] how wonderful.
Maybe they came up with the stepstool solution 1st but were worried OSHA would declare the stands unsafe and require them to either raise the warehouse floor or retool the plant with machinery controls more friendly to the vertically-challenged.
I think if I change careers I’ll do a Norton impersionation and become a sewer worker. Then I’ll hire a pitbull and sue the City to have them raise the height of the drainage mains so I don’t bang my head while slushing through the shit.
Or maybe their concern was that skirt-wearing female employees would leave for fear of the exposure caused by standing on stools, leading to EEOC lawsuits. Or maybe they had metal stands which interfered with local radio transmissions (FCC). Or the step stools produced toxic dust when abraded by footwear (EPA). Or the stools would have to be taken from local dairy farmers, causing potential contamination of milk product (FDA).
You’re right! Damn these federal agencies preventing businesses from helping their disabled employees!
JBW: Even if you want to pooh-pooh CATO’s intentions (market liberalism) that is a disturbing number of complaints.
Yup, it is. But why do we assume that a high volume of complaints and lawsuits represents only, or even primarily, a large number of disabled (or pseudo-disabled) people trying to game the system, rather than including a large number of employers blatantly discriminating against the disabled? Have we all had such universally wonderful experiences working for the Cheeryble Brothers and suchlike scrupulously kind, accomodating, helpful employers that we can’t conceive how laziness, pennypinching, or indifference on the part of management could constitute a major part of the problem here?
We’ve all read the stories about the person with dyslexia suing an employer over a job that requires reading comprehenion or the wheelchair bound bartender suing a tavern owner because the barback wasn’t accessible.
Sure we have; everybody likes tut-tutting over horror stories about greedy individuals who try to take advantage of the system in the most ridiculously barefaced ways. And, of course, businesses like to see such stories in print too, because it reinforces the impression that legal regulation of businesses is stupid and unnecessary. However, such anecdotes prove nothing at all about whether most of the real-life complaints filed really are ridiculous or trivial.
*I bet if you listed those 15,000 complaints from most to least ludicrous the hilariously ridiculous ones alone wouldn’t fit on this thread. *
Your bet is not evidence, though.
Think about it, that’s 15,000 employers, merchants and municipalities dragged through either the bureaucratic of justice system.
And I’m heartily sorry for whichever ones of them were suffering from a frivolous or mendacious complaint that they’d done nothing to deserve. I’m not really sorry at all for the ones that were simply trying to get away with blatant and unjustifiable discrimination. And so far, nobody has identified which of that 15,000 were which.
A good percentage of which have had both their freedom abridged and their property taken while not even knowing the were non-compliant.
What exactly is the figure on that “good percentage”, please, and what’s your cite for it? I’m also quite puzzled about what seems to be an attempt here to plead ignorance of non-compliance as an excuse. Isn’t it the responsibility of “employers, merchants, and municipalities” to know what the laws are that affect their activities and to take the necessary steps to ensure compliance with them? The provisions and passage of the ADA were never exactly secret, you know.
Let’s hope the FCC doesn’t enforce some obscure “Internet Wisecrack” statute, cause if they do, they’re gonna be coming for your ass (maybe even in a black helicopter)
They can take my internet wisecrack when they pry it from my cold, dead keyboard…
From my COLD, DEAD KEYBOARD!!
Originally posted by JohnBckWLD:
I’ve never met a wheelchair-bound bartender - I suspect it’s because most wheelchair users are aware that this is a job that’s off limits to them unless they open a bar themselves & put money into needed modifications; thus, they never bother with training.
Incidentally, a friend of mine who happens to bartend is always saying that if she ever scrapes up enough money, she’s going to open a bar & wheelchair modify the barback so I’ll be able to guest bartend. Oh, and it’ll have a big bathroom with handrails that opens with a key 
If the dream ever comes true, I’ll be sure & invite y’all. 
Of course, as it turns out, the biggest force restricting my free speech is my corporate employer, who rather ironically even bounces e-mail to me that has the words “Big Brother” in the subject line! But, since I am free to sell my labor to someone else instead, I am apparently not supposed to view this as any restriction on my freedom. [And you libertarians wonder why we all don’t embrace your world view?]
You mean they have some control over your e-mail even when you aren’t on their premises or using their computers?
—The OP has made the claim that the ADA has been ineffectual. the question of “should it have been enacted” and ‘should government regulate these things’ is another thread.—
I think it is perfectly important and relevant to consider the aspect of justice in concerns to the nature of whether a law is effectual or not. Laws don’t simply affect material things, and the injustice of laws can have very real effects on very real people, regardless of what one might think of them and their behavior.
You are welcome to disagree.
—It is undeniable fact that we regulate all sorts of aspects of business. If a business wants to avail itself of public resources (such as roads, fire, police protection etc.), it has the corresponding obligation to provide it’s goods/services to the public according to the laws.—
Any laws? The very thing worth discussing, when we discuss justice, is whether certain laws are appropriate or not in the first place. You’re simply bypassing the issue.
It seems to me rather that wring is trying to keep the discussion on track. Examinations of “justice” have bearing on underlying resistance to or acceptance of laws; they are not directly relevant to questions of effectiveness, which call for objective measurements.
Pissing and moaning about government intrusion into peaceful honest bidness, while perennially fascinating to Dopers, is merely obfuscatory in a debate centered around a question of fact.
xeno has correctly interpreted my point.
Originally Posted by Kimstu
The from my perspective:
The (nobly-intentioned) ADA law as originally written (by lawyers for lawyers, but that’s another story) has problems & is too vague. When passed in 1990, a veritable Pandora’s Box was opened.
Bad Law: Vagueness in Definition
From The Macinac Center:
**A law that was supposed to help foster access of the disabled It doesn’t legally define a disability and we’re left with yet another case of “judicial legislation.” Why is it up to the US Supreme Court to decide the intention of the law and what can defined is a disability?
Hence: Complaints & Suits Filed
Even the Center for Accessible Society points out:
If I’m to take the Center for Accessible Society at their word; if EEOC, as an executive branch firewall, prevented 90% of complaints from going to court, how did these little chestnuts end up in front of the judiciary?
From those cold-hearted libertarians at CATO:[ul][li]Ryder Systems, Inc. let go a truck driver because his epileptic seizures were regarded as a safety hazard. A jury decided Ryder had discriminated against the driver because of his health condition, and awarded him $5.5 million.[]Ship officers have won suits against oil companies for the right to command vessels despite serious problems with…alcoholism.[]A dentist who was dismissed for fondling his patients sued under the ADA, claiming that such urges constitute a disability[]An employee with memory problems that made her unable to perform her tasks adequately sued after being fired[]A woman’s claim that so-called recovered memories caused her to become depressed and unable to perform her job; she argued that that constituted a protected disability under the ADAA Washington, D.C., worker caught falsifying security records in a warehouse claimed he had an impulse to wrongdoing and is seeking ADA protection[/ul][/li]When you start introducing trial lawyers into the mix, employers start over-complying, making bad decisions because of the fear of dragged into court (at their own expense):
UCLA hospital officials allowed a surgeon to operate on patients—18 of whom he infected—even though they knew he had a serious and highly-transmittable disease. They did so to avoid claims of discrimination against the surgeon based on his “disability.”
Followed by (at least on cite-able case of) paranoid decision making
Those lawsuits & employer decisions were idiotic, but had Congress enumerated what constitutes a disability none of this crap would have occurred.
In my opinion, it should have been limited to those with certain physiological disabilities (i.e. to assist the blind, the deaf and the wheelchair-bound). Almost everyone could find a personal trait that could be loosely defined as a disability of some sort (i.e. diseased, depressed, dyslexic, alcoholic, drug-addicted, obese, short, below normal IQ, etc…the list could almost go on forever). If you have some time, read this opinion article “Under the ADA, We May All Be Disabled” from the 5/99 WSJ.
Nor is compliance defined. Can proprietors or employers take the necessary steps to ensure compliance?
“Reasonable accommodation?”
“Undue hardship?"
The issue of compliance directly impacts me. I own a small tap/restaurant. This is a guide sent to me by the NRA (not the gun, the restaurant association) based on Title 3 law. I’ll truthfully answer it and estimate costs related to it:
$ If you have on-site parking, are there sufficient designated and marked accessible parking spaces? Each accessible space should be at least 8-feet wide with a marked 5-foot wide minimum level access aisle next to it. Are the accessible spaces the ones closest to the accessible entrance, and are they marked with the international symbol of accessibility? Can at least one in every eight accessible spaces accommodate a lift-equipped van? Is there a continuous, unobstructed path of travel from on-site parking, drop-offs, bus stops and public sidewalks to the restaurant entry that is free of stairs? The path should be at least 36 inches wide.
No, on all counts
We have 3 parking spaces out front on a main county thoroughfare and the rear of the building has access to a municipal town parking lot. I’m assuming compliance with the above is the responsibility of my town / county.
$$ Is the path of travel free of cracks, bumps and other surface irregularities that could cause someone to trip or fall?
No
Sidewalks are not my property. By cracks I hope they don’t mean sidewalk expansion joints. Step on a crack, break you mother’s back
$$$ Do curbs along the path of travel have curb cuts or ramps?
Yes
$$$$ Are there continuous handrails at both sides of all stairways? Do all ramps longer than 6 feet have sturdy and secure railings on both sides?
No
The front entry is on grade, the back entry and patio are accessed by a concrete ramp with a railing on one side.
$$$$$ Are ramp slopes safe and convenient for people using wheelchairs?
No Idea
What constitutes safe? A 5 degree slope? 10 degrees, 15 degrees?
$$$$$$ Are ramp surfaces stable, firm and nonslip?
Kind of
They’re not completely non-slip when there’s snow on the ground.
$$$$$$$ *Are at least 50 percent of all public entrances accessible? For example, do entrance doors have at least a 32-inch clear opening, and are door handles no higher than 48 inches and possible to operate by someone with limited use of his or her hands?
If any customer entrance is not accessible, is it posted with a visible sign that clearly indicates the location of the accessible entrance?
Yes
** Are all aisles and pathways at least 36 inches wide? Are there clear floor areas located throughout for a person using a wheelchair to reverse direction?
Is the path of travel free of protuding objects that pose hazards for people with visual disabilities?
No
Would have to tear-out 5 booths to comply. Lost business/turnover = 30%. Renovation cost = At least $5,000.
*** At counters and bars that exceed 34 inches in height, is there also a portion of the main counter that is between 28 and 34 inches high and at least 60 inches in length? Or is service available at accessible tables or counters within the same area?
No
It’s a bar, not a breakfast nook. If we had to lower a 5’ section of the bar, we’d be tearing out an antique marble to and 18” wide oak Chicago bar-rail. Cost = Immeasurable
Are at least 50 percent of all self-service shelves at foodservice lines within reach of a person using a wheelchair?
? Is the path of travel to the public restroom at least 36 inches wide? Are there signs at inaccessible restrooms that give directions to accessible restrooms? Are there raised lettering and Braille signs identifying restrooms? Is the restroom doorway at least 32 inches wide? Is at least one accessible toilet stall? At accessible toilets, are there grab bars behind and on the side wall nearest the toilet, or on both side walls of a 36-inch wide alternative toilet stall? Is the faucet control easy to grasp with one hand, and can it be operated without tight grasping, tight pinching or twisting of the wrist? Is at least one of each control, dispenser, receptacle or other equipment located within reach of a person using a wheelchair?
No, Except for the Braille sign and one faucet control knob being reachable.
Only 2’8”. Building layout makes it almost impossible to modify. Only a very skilled wheelchair navigator with a very narrow chair could fit in the bathrooms.
?? Is the path of travel to the public telephones and drinking fountains at least 36 inches wide? Is there clear floor space of at least 30 to 48 inches in front of the phone?
No
Once again, too narrow. The payphone is in an old wooden antique phone booth (once used by Chas Lindbergh) with a glass bi-fold door. It affords a caller privacy because it is only 10” away from a booth.
We definitely do not / can not comply with the ADA, but we’re not criminals. It would be impossible to “take the necessary steps to ensure compliance.” Yes Apos we do use the “roads, fire, police protection etc.” as well as breathe the same air a private citizens, and we too pay for those services. The saving grace is a (shaky) loophole with regards to access to foodservice areas: Modifications that result in significant loss of sales space are not required.
Again both gaping and vague at the same time, why have the law at all if I can use that as an excuse for non-compliance?
Corrections, Clarifications and Amendments to the Law
The SCOTS ruled in May, 2002 the ADA does not permit a court to award legal fees for plaintiff’s attorneys in situations when an alleged violation of the ADA was resolved before a trial verdict or a court-ordered consent decree. Unfortunately, HR 914 and S782, which basically restrict most other civil awards in situations when violations are resolved before a verdict continues to languish in both chambers’ committees for over a year and a half! Why, I blame the ABA. The trial lawyers who are making their 1/3 of all settlements have the Congress on marionette strings.
Can I find fault with the laws’ intention?
No
Is it a good law (in the way that it’s written?
No
Has The Americans with Disabilities Act has done more harm than good?
Maybe not yet but if things continue they have without correction, Yes
No, xenophon41, any pissing or moaning that comes as a result of the trampling of individual liberties isn’t trivial or obfuscatory. It’s (dare I sound so corny) American.
How anyone who values freedom can continue to support a law so poorly written that it persecutes innocent citizens all in the name of helping other disabled ones and their lecherous attorneys is beyond my comprehension.
Point of order: I never said p&m about government was trivial (which JohnBckWLD must know). Nor did I say any damn thing about the “trampling of individual liberties”, no example of which has been offered in this thread.
JBW, I recommend that you avail yourself of the same links to the ADA homepage I provided earlier for december. You can find the reasonable and inexpensive solutions to your ADA concerns within.
Oh, and get someone with good reading comprehension to explain that Center for An Accessible Society article to you. I don’t think you quite managed to grasp the point of the 90% figure.
pldennison,
I spend nearly a quarter of my life (and more of my waking existence) at work so the control they exert is quite pervasive. I am not saying that they don’t have the right to do this. I am just telling you the fact that the restrictions I feel placed on my liberty stem more from them than they do for the government. You can simply deny my feelings but that is not going to help convince me that I will be happier in a world with even more corporate / private control and less of a public sphere than there is now.
JBW: *“Congress left many of the ADA’s key terms, such as “reasonable accommodation” and “undue hardship” undefined. The U.S. Supreme Court will soon decide whether Congress intended the law to apply to only the most severely handicapped or just about anybody with a problem, because the law itself was not clear.
A law that was supposed to help foster access of the disabled It doesn’t legally define a disability and we’re left with yet another case of “judicial legislation.” *
I don’t really think the law would have been better if it had legislated strict detailed definitions of “disability” or “reasonable accomodation”, which are very broad-concept terms whose interpretations are bound to change. You sound shocked at the prospect of what you call “judicial legislation”, i.e., judges interpreting the meaning of the law, but that is very commonly done for laws involving broad concepts, including ones like “bad faith” or “protected speech”.
And I think your suggestion to restrict the concept of “disability” to certain physiological conditions, a la the Cato Institute’s description, is extremely lousy. Certain mental illnesses, for example, are disabling even by the severest standards, as are various physical illnesses that don’t confine one to a wheelchair, as are various perceptual disorders that don’t make one legally blind or deaf.
I’d a hell of a lot rather put up with judges slowly and laboriously constructing a body of precedent (whose interpretation will naturally change over time) about how to construe the current wording of the ADA, and slogging through the inevitable gray areas and abuses, than have some bureaucrat flip through his Officially Recognized Disabilities List and tell a complainant “Sorry, your disability is not officially recognized, sucks to be you, now scram.”
–Bad Law: Vagueness in Definition –
Sometimes vagueness is required in order to get a law passed. That’s just Realpolitik. In time, things are cleared up. If the courts get it wrong, then the legislature can (and often does) tweak the law.
–Hence: Complaints & Suits Filed –
First, thanks for the link.
Second, I wasn’t able to find any of those “gems” you cited (although I was able to find many conservative websites repeating them). I suspect there is much more to those cases than the pundits would have you believe.
If you are interested, the ABA put out a summary of all federal appellate cases addressing the ADA and FMLA from November 2001 through December 2001 http://www.bna.com/bnabooks/ababna/rnr/2002/absence.doc I wonder if you are offended by any of those.
–Followed by (at least on cite-able case of) paranoid decision making –
A consequence of not defining terms is that the court system has to. <shrug>. Now we know. You are not disabled (under §12111(8)(A)) if something corrects your disability. http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/97-1943.ZO.html
–Nor is compliance defined.–
If the above cite is correct, the number of successful plaintiffs have been miniscule. My guess is that if you do the right thing, and you will win a lawsuit. Ever consider legal negligence? What is negligent? When are you acting prudently and when are you not? There are lots of areas in the law that defy an application of a bright line.
Additionally, the EEOC puts out some guidelines http://www.eeoc.gov/ada/adahandbook.html#reasonable
–Corrections, Clarifications and Amendments to the Law–
I think you mean May, 2001, not 2002. http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=US&navby=case&vol=532&invol=598
Anyway, I don’t see a problem with limiting attorney’s fees to trial verdicts and court-ordered consent decrees. If you want to settle the case, and you want your attorney fees, then make sure you include that in your settlement agreement. Don’t settle the case and then try and end run around the settlement for more money.