Monday, July 05, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

JANE ANN MORRISON: Handicapped access battle lost at federal buildings, just starting with buses

The feds don't provide handicapped parking at Las Vegas federal buildings.

If you're handicapped and want to see U.S. Sens. Harry Reid or John Ensign, or if you're a witness in a trial or a juror, be prepared to work up a sweat to get into the Lloyd D. George U.S. Courthouse.

The parking lot next to the handicapped ramp isn't available for the handicapped. That parking lot is for courthouse employees only. The courthouse offers no public parking. Thus, no handicapped parking is required.

"It's a lost cause in Las Vegas," said Paul Martin, president of Nevadans for Equal Access.

The Foley Federal Building now being refurbished to house other federal offices won't offer any handicapped parking either.

The nearest public parking will be two blocks away at a city parking garage rather than the lot adjacent to the building.

Two blocks doesn't sound too bad, but it's a far piece for someone such as Martin, a diabetic, who uses a motorized wheelchair because of muscular dystrophy.

When it's above 100 degrees, it's worse.

"There is no public parking at any of the federal courthouses in Nevada," said Bethany Rich, spokeswoman for the General Services Administration. "All parking, both surface and underground, is controlled for security purposes and restricted to building tenants."

Blame terrorists for the elimination of all public parking in Nevada's federal buildings, not the GSA.

Rich said the GSA is "committed to assuring access, so we work with the city to designate handicapped facilities in nearby facilities."

But that parking is not close enough, said Martin, who has made the trek himself.

During his nine years with Nevadans for Equal Access, Martin estimated that 90 percent of the complaints that come to the organization are about handicapped parking.

Because Martin sees the federal building issue as hopeless, he's trying to fight the good fight with the Regional Transportation Commission and the Nevada Department of Transportation.

On Wednesday, when officials and the news media were oohing and aahing over how spiffy the new Metropolitan Area Express bus system was, a few handicapped folks were having trouble getting on.

Martin said several of the handicapped who tried MAX out at the opening found their handicapped wheelchairs were too big for the handicapped spots on the bus.

At several of the high tech bus stops on Las Vegas Boulevard north of Cheyenne Avenue, Martin showed me another problem.

To access the bus stop, asphalt has been slapped down on each end.

Except on some of the bus stops, the asphalt wasn't graded; it ends abruptly with a drop of 4 or 5 inches. Coming off the asphalt, someone in a wheelchair probably would go tumbling down. Trying to get up on it would be another problem.

Picture this: A handicapped person, let's say former U.S. Sen. Max Cleland, a triple amputee, glides off a MAX bus, cruises along the asphalt and goes crashing into an unpaved parking lot.

If he didn't crash, his option might be riding his wheelchair in the bus lane in those stretches where sidewalks aren't available.

RTC assured me the asphalt issue and whether the wheelchairs should use the bus lane was NDOT's problem.

NDOT said this was the first they'd heard of this and, because of the holiday weekend, couldn't get an answer Friday.

RTC spokeswoman Ingrid Reisman said the problem with handicapped access on MAX applies only to oversized handicapped chairs. Regular-sized chairs fit, she said.

Presumably those people have oversized chairs for a need, but that's just a guess. Maybe they deliberately use oversized wheelchairs just to aggravate the RTC.

State Sen. Dina Titus, who chairs an interim legislative committee on programs for the disabled, said whoever is responsible should fix the asphalt and provide access (other than a bus lane) for handicapped people using MAX.

"Do it right the first time. It's easier and cheaper than having to go back and do it over," Titus said. "Plus it's the right thing to do."

It also would be the right thing to do to provide handicapped parking spots at the federal buildings. The terrorists have won the parking war. The MAX war is just beginning.

Jane Ann Morrison's column appears Monday, Thursday and Saturday. E-mail her at jane@reviewjournal.com or call 383-0275.