San Francisco Examiner 9/28/87

Still waiting for the bus

Photo by Examiner/Kurt Rogers: A row of policemen in dark uniforms facing away from the camera make most of the photo black. At their sides you can see night sticks and their hands on their hips. Between them you can see a very young (about 6 years old) Jennifer Keelan mouth open in a loud chant and behind her, barely visible is her mother Cindy. To the right Diane Coleman is framed by two other policemen, and between them mostly hidden by the officer's legs, is Bob Kafka.

Caption reads: A contingent of disabled and elderly protesters roll up Post Street in S.F. after holding Union Square rally.

Headline: Disabled protest transit group’s policies
By Ken O'Toole
of the Examiner staff

Disabled people from across the nation took to the streets of San Francisco Sunday to demand better access to public transportation, rolling through downtown streets in a wheelchair caravan that stretched from Union Square to the downtown Hilton Hotel.

Chanting, “We want access” and "We will ride," the crowd of several hundred disabled and their supporters rolled with police escorts to the hotel, where the annual meeting of the American Public Transit Association was taking place.

The protesters were halted at the hotel's doors by a line of police, and after a brief rally moved on to City Hall, where they confronted transit association members going to a cocktail party.

Police arrested 20 people, including 16 in wheelchairs, for blocking the sidewalk and failing to disperse. They were cited and released.

One demonstrator. who was not wheelchair-bound, was booked for felony assault after he kicked a police officer in the chest. Police estimated that there were 500 demonstrators.

The march, spirited but orderly, did not seriously disrupt traffic as scores of wheelchair-bound protesters voiced their displeasure with the associations policies and called for restoration of a national transit policy that would require wheelchair lifts on all public buses and trolleys.

Both protesters and officials of the Municipal Railway noted the irony of the demonstration taking place in a city that has one of the best disabled-accessibility programs in the United States. California and Michigan are the only states that require all new buses to have wheelchair lifts.

However, outside California, most disabled people are "segregated
from public transit, and are often regulated to lengthy waiting lists for
door-to-door van service" or no service at all, said a spokeswoman for the September Alliance for Accessible Transit.

The group, in conjunction with American Disabled for Accessible
Public Transit, plans more demonstrations as the transit association
meets here through Thursday.

Transit association Executive Vice President Jack Gilstrap said,
“it's not a disagreement over whether we serve the disabled; it's how its to be done. Our position, and we're consistent with federal law and the courts, is for each community to decide how the service (to the handicapped) should be supplied."

He said that lifts can cost $10,000 to $15,000 and that individual communities should be able to decide whether the money might be better spent on other transit woes.

"lt's a very emotional issue," Gilstrap said, "but (public-transit agencies) have short resources. You're doing a good job here in the Bay Area, but with an extraordinary level of taxes."

Muni spokeswoman Annette Wire said a total of 280 buses In the
system have lifts, and 16 Muni lines are totally accessible to the handicapped.

At a Union Square rally before the march, Lt. Gov. Leo McCarthy
called for full access to public transportation.

Saying laws that guarantee rights to all people have been undermined, McCarthy said disabled people have a right to access to school and work through public transportation. "Transportation means independence," McCarthy said, “and independence means opportunity."

The Rev. Cecil Williams of Glide Memorial Church called on the disabled to take America to a new task... You may be called to set what's wrong right."

A wheelchair-bound San Franciscan named Gill rolled into the crowd
of demonstrators at Union Square and said he liked what he saw. But he said, “San Francisco is moving in the right direction. I travel sometimes miles a day (in the electric wheelchair) and I usually don‘! have any problems. except with the occasional inexperienced bus driver."

Joe Carley, of Dallas, Texas, said since he was restricted to a wheelchair several years ago, at age 38, I realized: ‘This can happen to at anybody. Transportation is the A-Number 1 concern for anyone who's disabled. Federal and state governments don't really see transportation as a right. We want to live, not just survive."

Photo by Examiner/Kurt Rogers: A really large group of people, many in wheelchairs head down a street.
Caption reads: Demonstrators protest American Public Transit Association's policies on disabled accessibility.