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Home / Albums / Keyword wheelchair activists 2
ADAPT (383)
The Gazette, Montreal, Monday, October 3, 1988 Final [edition] 50 cents Title: Police arrest 28 wheelchair activists after protest in hotel lobby By Michael Doyle and Catherine Buckie of the Gazette Twenty-eight wheelchair protesters were arrested and charged with mischief last night after 50 of them staged a noisy demonstration in the lobby of the Sheraton Center on Dorchester Blvd. The protesters were demonstrating against the lack of mass transit facilities for the handicapped. They sang We Shall Overcome and chanted “Access is a Civil Right!” as they blocked off elevators and escalators at the downtown hotel. Police took the wheelchair activists to the Bonsecours St. station. They were to be arraigned before a judge at 1 a.m. today. “We don’t want to hold them for nothing,” said Const. Bernard Perrier. “We want to put them before a judge as soon as possible. It will be up to the judge to decide what happens to them after that.” The demonstrators were mostly members of a U.S. group, American Disabled for Accessible Public Transit (ADAPT). They are here to badger transit-authority representatives from across the continent – including officials of the Montreal Urban Community Transit Corp. – who are attending the convention of the American Public Transit Association. “We’re just trying to make their convention as inaccessible to them as public transit is for us,” group organizer Rev. Wade Blank of Denver, Colo., said earlier that day. A squad of about 80 police officers was called in to clear the hotel lobby. One protester, Bob Kafka, a 42-year-old Vietnam veteran from Austin, Texas whose neck was broken in a car accident, had chained himself to a railing in the lobby. Police cut the chain with shears. The activists decided to demonstrate at the Sheraton because a large number of delegates to the transit convention are staying there, Kafka said. “We’re sorry for the inconvenience, but we’ve been inconvenienced all our lives,” he said. Hotel general manager Alfred Heim, who used a bullhorn to read a portion of the Eviction Act to the protesters before the police moved in, said he expected some trouble because the protesters attend each transit convention. The demonstration closed the westbound lanes on Dorchester Blvd. outside the hotel for about two hours. It was the second time yesterday that the demonstrators had disrupted traffic on Dorchester Blvd. Earlier, more than 75 of the wheelchair activists blocked traffic outside the Queen Elizabeth Hotel, site of the convention. Police there put up barricades to contain the activists, who were eventually allowed to line up single-file on the north side of the street, away from the hotel entrance. Picture, Page A-3 The end
ADAPT (367)
San Francisco Examiner 10/1/87 Photo by Examiner/Gordon Stone: The frame of the picture is filled with people in wheelchairs, and people standing. All are protesters and in the center is a woman wearing glasses raises her hand in a power fist with a piece of paper in it, above her head. In front of him is a woman laying back in her chair (Laurie ___ from Chicago). Everyone is facing forward. Caption reads: CAROL RAUGUST, WITH FLYER, IS AMONG WHEELCHAIR ACTIVISTS They have a quarrel with public transit officials, convening in S.F. Title: Handicapped activists get day in court By John D. O'Connor OF THE EXAMINER STAFF The Hall of Justice resounded with victory whoops and the whirl of motorized wheelchairs as 43 'handicapped activists arrested for blockading the Powell Street cable car line got their day in court. Protesters used their arraignment Wednesday before Municipal Court Judge Philip Moscone as a platform for a new attack against the American Public Transit Association, which they say has not done enough to provide the handicapped with access to public transit. Moscone allowed designated speakers to address the court after each group of blockaders entered no contest pleas to charges of obstructing a public thoroughfare. The $50 fine the charge carried was dropped as Moscone credited the night the 43 demonstrator spent in jail as "time served." A second charge of failing to disperse was dropped "in the interest of justice," according to Deputy District Attorney Randall Knox. Jane Jackson, who spoke on behalf the first group of 14 wheelchair-bound demonstrators arraigned Wednesday, seized the opportunity to charge APTA with denying handicapped citizens of their civil rights. "It is for this reason that we believe Jack Gilstrap (APTA executive Ace president) should be asked to resign or should be forced to resign," Jackson said. "APTA is not acting in good faith." More than 15,000 public transit officials from around North America attended the four-day convention. Officials of the transit group have said they feel the access question should be handled on a local level. Jackson also said the coalition of handicapped-rights groups, which captured national media attention with four days of protests and blockades across the city, was pulling out of a scheduled meeting with APTA officials Thursday. "It's the only move left open to us," Jackson said later while members of the September Alliance for Accessible Transit and American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation cheered her and the other blockaders as they exited the courtroom. About 75 wheelchair-bound protesters lined the hallway outside the courtroom, chanting and clapping in approval and support as each group of blockaders were arraigned and allowed to leave. "They're our heroes," said Connie Arnold of San Rafael. "They're standing up for us." During the arraignments, police, sheriff's and emergency medical personnel stood by as defendants were wheeled in or entered the courtroom under their own power. Jennifer Keelan, a 6-year-old girl from Tempe, Ariz., whose bouncy enthusiasm and apparent unconcern over her handicap captivated the press and boosted the resolve of protesters, was wheeled in by a sheriff's deputy and sat writing her name over and over again in a small notebook. Unlike the group's earlier demonstrations, Wednesday's action was peaceful and there were no arrests. Protesters had staged noisy and sometimes violent demonstrations outside the APIA convention at Moscone Center Monday and on the steps of City Hall Sunday night. Handicapped-rights group organizers said Wednesday was their last day in The City as the APTA convention at Moscone Center ended a four-day conference and transit officials left town. But protesters declared the string of rallies and blockades a success. "We made our point," said Marilyn Golden of Oakland. "Now maybe they will listen."