Letters to the Editor
I read the article in
the most recent Access Press (September 10, 2005) entitled “An Ethical Dilemma,” and
was happy to learn there will be a protest scheduled at the conference
at the Hyatt Regency in Minneapolis as Michael Schiavo, and others
with no morals concerning the right to life, are scheduled to be
honored as heroes by the promoters of physician-assisted suicide
and euthanasia.
I’d like to know, however, where the protesters were when
the movie, “Million Dollar Baby” came out. I had heard
the movie got best picture of the year last year, so took my companion,
who has one of those serious diseases that fall under the umbrella
of the MDA Association, to the film, not knowing in advance what
it was about (assisted suicide honored).
After we saw the movie, both of us were speechless, and I’m
sure my boyfriend must have been horrified. Not only must he deal
every day with a terrible disease, now the motion picture industry
was promoting the decisions of people who think it is okay to just
give up. My companion must have thought, too, along with countless
others, that their lives, their courageous example, their will
to live, are not worth anything and then, after seeing this movie,
depression, despair, and apathy are also allowed to enter their
lives.
Even though I was emotionally involved, I did manage to write a
few angry letters about “Million Dollar Baby” and got
upset every time some flippant, beautiful, young newscaster here
in the Twin Cities praised the movie. Since the movie starred Clint
Eastwood, and because he also directed it, this may be why I only
received one letter that supported my viewpoint. Somebody from
a newspaper wrote and said that there was not much I could do now
because the movie had already come out, but that I could tell people
not to buy the Video or DVD.
Hope you are successful at the protest on Friday, September 23,
2005, a conference that is being sponsored by Hennepin County Medical
Center to celebrate physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia.
I also hope your efforts are highlighted by the media. The groups
sponsoring this conference are not heroes—they are cowards.
They are people who would never volunteer to teach me how to use
this computer, who would never buy season tickets to the theater,
orchestra hall, and sporting events and take me along. They would
never help me get back into the church after feeling alienated or
help me overcome the effects of depression (big time). These are
just a few of the items my boyfriend, who has a serious disability,
has done for me (and others) although he has far fewer resources
than those sponsoring the conference.
Sincerely,
Anonymous
Letter to the Editor
I have recently needed to purchase a used wheelchair accessible
van with a lift due to my deteriorating health. In the last week
I have encountered difficulty parking in three locations, including
medical facilities, due to cars being parked in the van accessible
spaces.
The other day, I had
my signal on to turn into a van accessible parking space and a
man pulled into the space in front of me. I politely asked him
if I could have the parking space since I’m in a
power wheelchair and have a lift on my van. I need the extra space
for my van because of the lift. He swore at me and told me he could
park anywhere he wanted with his handicap parking permit. Onlookers
shook their heads in disgust but made no comments.
I am on a limited income
and will have a very tight budget to make my van payments. I hoped
when I got this van it would solve my problems getting out into
the community. I get so frustrated and upset when I can’t
park so I have to return home or have to try to arrange for someone
to travel with me.
I see two approaches
to addressing this issue. The first is to inform the public of
the problem. If people are aware of how they impact other disabled
people, they would change their behavior. The second approach is
more complicated. Either make all handicap parking spaces van accessible
or have them designated “Van ONLY.”
I’m open to any
suggestions.
Sincerely,
Judith of Plymouth
Dear Judith of Plymouth:
The problem you are having with utilizing van accessible parking
spaces with your lift-equipped van is very real and serious. The
clear purpose of the van accessible parking space is to provide an
eight-foot access aisle so that one can lower their lift or ramp
and still have maneuvering space to get off of the lift or ramp.
Several states have implemented more restrictive disability parking
laws allowing only vans to park in van accessible spaces, especially
in larger parking lots where a number of spaces are generally available.
Last session we were working on a similar provision in Minnesota,
which would have restricted van accessible disability parking spaces
to vehicles that obtained a special permit from the Minnesota Department
of Public Safety. We will continue to work on language in the 2006
session to restrict parking in van accessible spaces in larger parking
lots.
In the meantime, don’t
give up hope. The new building code, which will hopefully go into
effect during the summer of 2006, will require all new access aisles
to be a minimum of eight feet wide. This means all the disability
parking spaces in new and renovated parking lots must provide the
space needed to get out of your van.
As we work to pass legislation
dictating how one should behave in public, let me take this opportunity
to say to all those who knowingly use van accessible parking spaces
that don’t need the extra
space and where other spaces are available – please don’t!
Please be polite! Disability parking works well only when we are
considerate and respectful of one another’s needs. If you don’t
need the eight-feet, leave it for someone who does!
Margot Imdieke Cross,
Accessibility Specialist
Minnesota State Council on Disability
Letter to the Editor
I don’t think that the discussion of the “tragedy” of
Hurricane Katrina should be seen as a diversion from the issues surrounding
race and disability In fact, I think this disaster provides a stark
and telling illustration of how the intersections of the issues of
race and disability play out in a concrete way in people’s
lives.
Throughout this week,
I’ve been struck by the presence of
disability. In the New York Times, I read of a woman in the Superdome
grabbing a reporter’s arm, pleading for water for her daughter,
a wheelchair user. “I’m afraid she’s going to have
a seizure,” the mother cried. On NPR, I heard the voice of
a man calling out, “Dilantin! I need Dilantin!” The President
of Jefferson Parrish broke down as he told of a man, who’d
been reassuring his mother, institutionalized in a nursing home that
help was on the way—only to learn that she drowned on Friday.
Then there is the image of the woman in the wheelchair, dead outside
the Convention Center.
I’ve been enraged on so many different levels this past week—at
the way that people with disabilities seem to have been forgotten
by those who ordered the evacuation of the city and by the rescuers,
at the appalling conditions everyone—disabled and non-disabled— who
sought shelter in the Superdome and the Convention Center endured. “I
was heartened when I read of entertainer Kanye West, Jesse Jackson
and other African American ministers stating the obvious racial dimension
to this disaster. That this disaster had an especially horrific impact
on disabled African Americans is clear.
We need to re-think
our use of the word “tragedy” when
applied to this. While these events were undeniably tragic, they
were hardly inevitable. For a start, let’s think about why
the levees broke in the first place. Our nation as a whole may have
problems with its infrastructure, but these problems are particularly
acute in poor communities. I am sure there are statistics about this,
which I don’t have at the ready, but anyone who has ever wheeled
or walked along the sidewalk in an upper middle class neighborhood
and also wheeled or walked along one in a poor neighborhood knows
this difference in their bones. Infrastructure—from sidewalks
to curb cuts to levees—is under funded in poor communities.
That a hurricane would hit New Orleans was inevitable. That the levees,
which had been neglected during both Republic and Democratic administrations,
were not being adequately maintained was also a known fact.
And while we may be
assured that the increase in ferocity of hurricanes has nothing
to do with global warming, I know I’m not the only
one—Daniel Shorr was voicing the same question on NPR—who
wonders if this spate of recent hurricanes is an opening salvo in
the more extreme weather predicted as a result of global warming.
I’m also wary when the sole solution offered is to donate
to the victims. The impulse to reach out and offer help to those
in need is a generous and good one. As people with disabilities,
many of us have experienced charity first-hand, and we understand
that the charity model has many drawbacks. There are the worthy recipients
of charity—the smiling, grateful cripples—and the unworthy—the
angry, bitter cripples; the “looters,” those who, as
Barbara Bush put it, “were underprivileged anyway, so this
is working very well for them.”
Above all, charity keeps
in place the notion that the “problem” is
located in the bodies of people with disabilities, in the individuals
who have been displaced, rather than in social structures and economic
policies. I would like to see us putting our energies, our time,
and our money into demanding structural change.
I think we, as disability activists and scholars, need to enter
into the national dialogue, loudly and clearly, stating that these
deaths of PWDs were not inevitable tragedies, but were the result
of government policies that ignore our needs. We need to say that
this neglect does not hit all disabled people equally, but was especially
lethal for the poor, predominantly African-American, residents of
New Orleans and surrounding communities.
I think we should also demand that, as the dead are counted, the
powers that be also collect statistics on how many disabled people
are among the dead. How many were found in nursing homes? How many
were found in community care facilities? I think the answers to those
questions will shock the conscience of our nation.
We need to reach out
to those people with disabilities who survived, and do all we can
to enable their voices to be heard. In general, I’m not a big fan of working within the legislative process,
but I think this is a time when it makes sense to contact your senators
and representatives and get them to ask some hard questions in the
hearings that will be happening in the upcoming weeks. What were
the plans for evacuating institutions—nursing homes, community
care facilities? What were the plans for communicating with people
who were deaf and hearing impaired? How was lifesaving medication
going to be delivered to people who had been forced to flee? In short,
what thought was given to the lives and needs of people with disabilities?
We should be writing letters to editors, calling reporters; talking
in our classes and to everyone we can about the impact of Katrina
on people with disabilities, and especially on those in our community
who have the fewest resources.
Anne Finger
anniedigit@mindspring.com
Letter to the Editor:
This letter is intended
to clarify a quote which was printed in the September 10th edition
in the article entitled PCA Program Changes stating “Every organization a PCA is employed with must get
a background study clearance for that individual PCA. The DHS background
study costs each organization $25. This process is costly and time
consuming for the DHS Licensing Division and provider organizations.
It also produces increased workloads and backlogs in the processing
of the background studies.” I would like to take this opportunity
to expand and explain this quote by pulling from the article I wrote,
which was published in our organ-ization’s newsletter:
I attended the Department
of Human Services’ PCA Provider
Focus Group on August 12, 2005 to listen, learn, and discuss the
law and policy changes to the PCA Services in the State of Minnesota.
A representative from DHS Licensing Division informed everyone attending
this meeting that the new law provides the DHS Licensing Division
access to all Minnesota county court databases and the DHS Licensing
Division will be conducting daily searches of county databases against
all pending and cleared background study participants. This will
allow DHS to identify when an individual in their background study
database commits an offense considered a violation of the background
clearance. If this happens, the DHS Licensing Division will notify
the PCA organization immediately to have that person removed from
providing direct care.
I would like to see the DHS Licensing Division look at streamlining
the Background Study process. Every organization a PCA is employed
with must get a background study clearance for that individual PCA.
The DHS background study costs each organization $25. This process
is costly and time consuming for the DHS Licensing Division and provider
organizations. It also produces increased workloads and backlogs
in the processing of the background studies.
At a recent DHS NetStudy Training Course the trainer handed out slides
with the following current status information: 1,500+ have been trained
or are scheduled for NetStudy training; 1,783 NetStudy Accounts activated;
4,450 NetStudy users. It also stated that NetStudy processes over
100,000 studies which is 70% of the background studies processed
by DHS. The Background Studies are generating over $3.5 million for
DHS a year. While this sounds great to DHS, the $25 each organization
is paying for each background study is money which could go to increase
the pay for the Personal Care Attendants.
In light of the DHS checking daily with the county databases, I
would like to propose that the DHS Licensing Division and the Legislature
examine the idea of allowing the background study to travel with
the PCA Provider Number for 12 to 18 months from organization to
organization. As long as there is not a match from the county databases,
every 12 to 18 months a new background study is completed to update
the system. This would allow streamlining the process, employee cost
savings to both the DHS and Direct Care organizations, lessen the
workload and backlog for the DHS, and lessen the concerns of consumers
regarding time gaps in PCA services due to the background studies.
Judy Elling, MSW
Program Administrator, People Enhancing People
