TELECOM Digest Editor Noted in response to Lisa Hancock
<hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com> who wrote in message
news:telecom23.528.1@telecom-digest.org:
> Apparently the government got after the city and told them all
> polling places had to be more handicapped accessible, so they had
> to move out of SEK Senior Citizens.
Another example of the ADA removing the rights (and conveniences) of
the many to support a few, not by having them drive downtown, but
having everyone.
Jim Burks
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I am not so sure I agree with you on
this, Jim. In *my particular case* it is true that walking downtown to
do whatever from my home is a bit of a hassle. And voting was at
Memorial Hall, which is the north side of the downtown area. But our
entire town is only 2 miles long by about 2 miles wide and most people
if they drive just get in a car and get to wherever in two or three
minutes anyway. Truly, at the old voting place at SEK Senior Citizens
I could (when I felt sprightly) walk three blocks down the street,
vote, and walk three blocks home (although the trip coming back is up
a hill, and I was usually sort of tired after that walk. Now when
they told me to the jailhouse to vote (in the primary election), that
is six blocks away (the southern/eastern edge of the downtown area)
so I walked, but called the cab to get back home. When I went to vote
last Tuesday, I asked Jeff, the cab driver here, if he would mind
waiting for me unless he got another call while I was inside. He did
get another call so I walked over to the post office to dump my box
and stopped at the Radio Shack *then* called Jeff to come back and
pick me up there. But I can't complain *that much*; I ride around town
when I go anywhere using a City of Independence Senior Citizens card,
and get the ride for $1.50. (Usual cab fare anywhere in town is
$3.00, city pays half of the fare for old people and disabled people.)
Jeff's boss, the lady who owns the cab company says it sometimes is
a bummer getting the city to pay off every month; city in turn blames
the dead-beatery on the state of Kansas for not paying *them* on time.
So the ADA is a typical beaurocratic thing; they take from you one
place and give back in other ways. Argue about it if you want; like
all public servants they don't give a damn either way. And the lady
who owns the cab company says that *I* am one of the biggest 'coupon'
riders they have. She points out that most people using the
handicapped or old people coupons use them once or twice per *month*
to go to Walmart or the beauty salon, etc. She said "you (meaning me,
PAT) use them once or twice a *day*. Like this afternoon, after I
get this issue of the Digest out, I will go to Doctor Epp's Animal
Hospital with my cat, Callie to get her stitches out (she was 'fixed'
a couple weeks ago.) They won't charge me for taking her in her
case in the cab, and if Jeff is not busy he will wait there for me
to come back home. So I do okay with ADA, but maybe its the southeast
rural Kansas attitude working in my favor. PAT]
Jim Burks (jbburks@hotmail.com)