News: A matter of access or money?

^ thank you Ensign Smith great to be here.

as a technically disabled person, i am somewhat disturbed by this lawsuit. most disabled people know their limits. i know MY limits, although i choose to ignore them most of the time ;)...it bothers me that people wil take up arms for the disabled as though they do not realize their situation.

i have MS and i limp badly. i have a hard time walking and sometimes keeping my grip on things. does this mean i am going to sue someplace because i couldnt walk all the way across the lot or the park? am i going to sue someplace because i couldnt hold on to the $3.00 bottle of Pepsi i just dropped? heck no! and i dont need or want someone deciding that suing is the ONLY way to go!! others making these decisions on behlaf of the disabled do nothing but make the disabled appear to be petty and more helpless than they really are.

i DO agree about the washrooms being more accessible, as if i am ever in a wheelchair i will be grateful for that. but vending machines? come on, people!! now we're just nit-picking.

take it from someone who has been there and will be there in worse ways come 20 years from now....make a fuss now and you MIGHT get some results. fuss too much, and people are gonna stop listening.

I think this quote states it as good as any.

"(A) vast number of lawsuits are being filed, not because the plaintiffs themselves experience obstacles which genuinely prevented their equal access to facilities, but instead because a relatively small number of opportunists are combing the country looking for any infraction they can magnify into a claim from which they can personally profit."

http://www.cleveland.com/suncourier/news/index.ssf?/base/community-0/1172700536230850.xml&coll=4&thispage=4

Things should certainly be handicap accessible, but this nitpicking about railings that are 1 inch too high is ridiculous. It really is abusing the system.

But where is the line drawn?

We have LAWS for a reason, because the United States Government deemed them necessary.

So we let them slide on a railing here and this other thing there, next thing you know nothing will be done about it because, just like any other major corporation, these type of things get swept under the rug. This isn't about people with handicaps, this is about laws being enforced and something actually being done about it.

Everyone knows as well as I do, if something isn't documented and put into a legal action, there's no business that's going to act on it. It's gone on for FIFTEEN YEARS in this case.

Again, where is the line between right and wrong? So it'd be OK for a police officer to pull two people over for speeding and one of them is a beautiful woman in a brand new sports car and the other is a guy in a car that is barely passing state inspections. The guy was wrongfully breaking the speed limit and was written a ticket but because he "looked" shady they searched his car but found nothing. The female was breaking the speed limit and also had an open container in the car, but because she was gorgeous, the police officer let her slide by with a warning.

Yeah, if you were the guy you'd be pretty pissed. It was the cop's choice to let her go and there's nothing the guy can do about it. In this situation, these businesses have been the gorgeous girl for 15 years just sliding by under the radar. Now they face charges for something they should have corrected 15 years ago.

Nope, no sympathy here, none.

ADA.gov:
MYTH: The ADA is rigid and requires businesses to spend lots of
money to make their existing facilities accessible.

FACT: The ADA is based on common sense. It recognizes that
altering existing structures is more costly than making new
construction accessible. The law _only_ requires that public
accommodations (e.g. stores, banks, hotels, and restaurants)
remove architectural barriers in existing facilities when it is
"readily achievable", i.e., it can be done "without much
difficulty or expense." Inexpensive, easy steps to take include
ramping one step; installing a bathroom grab bar; lowering a
paper towel dispenser; rearranging furniture; installing offset
hinges to widen a doorway; or painting new lines to create an
accessible parking space.

The problem is that Cedar Point to the most part predates ADA.

If the buildings, rides, food stands, ect. are not handicapped accessible, were built before the ADA was ratifed, and are not modifiable without great difficulty and expense then Cedar Point does not need to upgrade them.

If the buildings, rides, food stands, ect. are not handicapped accessible, were built before the ADA was ratifed, and are modifiable without great difficulty and expense then Cedar Point needs and should upgrade.

If the buildings, rides, food stands, ect. are not handicapped accessible, were built after the ADA was ratifed, then it is considered a violation of the ADA.

The suit does not differentiate between the above cases. It simply states that the plaintiff was discriminated against.

Loopy, your example is poor and has no basis of arguement.

This entire issue comes down the diffrence between ethics and legality. Disabled Patriots of America INC are pure scum, what they are doing is essentially extortion, and as a member of the military I'm quite disgusting that they using the "Patriots of America" moniker to add legitimacy to what they are doing. But the simple fact remains, if they can find some violation of the ADA and get someone (like Bonnie Kramer) to "complain" about it, they win. The simple fact of the matter is that they are pinging legitimate infractions of the ADA, regardless of how insignificant they may be, and regardless of what their real motivation behind for bringing suit is. The reason these cases never go to court is because the defendants would lose, because as trifling as the complaint may be, if the infraction exists, the courts have to uphold the ADA. Is this an example of using the American justice system to steal money? Absolutely. Is that a problem in this country extending far beyond the bathrooms of our beloved amusement park? Absolutely! Do I have anything resembling a good answer as to how we can make everything fair for everyone? Hell no! Do you?

I have an uncle who recently passed away, he was in a wheel chair from a diving accident when he was younger. He had a viable lawsuit against a former employer involving the inability of the employer to have a wheel chair ramp installed properly. He was in the wheel chair before he was hired so it wasn't like the employer didn't know about this situation before hiring him as a counsler.
He ended up falling out of the chair and down a flight of stairs because of a gap between the ramp and the building.

He couldn't find a lawyer to help with his ada claim because of the amount of time and money that would be required to sue.

It's pretty sad that a lawyer would take up this fight but tell the little guy that really needs the legal help "sorry I don't want to deal with a hassel like that."

I'm sorry that happened to your uncle. It's a travesty he couldn't find anyone to help him. :(

That's a BIG second to was the Ensign said. Nobody cares about helping the little guy.

You have to remember also that a lot of the rides/ attractions at the park are grandfather in.

They do there best to make the older attractions ADA acessable, but sometimes money and other obsticals make it impossable to conform to ADA regulations.

I am all for ADA regulations, but some of the things they make a buisness owner do are just crazy. Most companies just cant afford to do some of the things they ask for.

We used to build haunted houses a few years back, and it has got to the point where you have to be mega rich just to be able to build one.

We had to buld ramps/ special doors, in the haunted house to make it ADA complient. We spent over $10.000, just to be up to ADA code. Over the 5 years that we had the haunted houses, we had a total of ZERO wheel chairs come thrue any of the attractions.

Every year they are adding new rules and codes. It got to the point where we could not afford to keep complying to all the new ADA codes, so we just sold eveything off and got out of making haunted houses all together.