Disabled cry foul to CAT

To ask Arleen Post how she feels about the Regional Transportation Commission is to pull the pin on a grenade of emotions. A few seconds of uneasy silence pass, then a hot blast of frustration tears through the room.

"I have no life anymore. They took away everything. They took away my rights. I can't get anyplace. They're a pack of idiots. I really and truly hate them," Post said.

So she's suing them. Earlier this year, Post filed a lawsuit against the RTC, which oversees the Citizens Area Transit bus system, for denying her access to CAT's paratransit service for the disabled. Despite suffering from heart disease, a degenerative back condition, arthritis and poor vision in her right eye, Post was told late last year she no longer qualified for paratransit.

CAT's decision left Post, who had used the service since its 1994 launch, stunned -- and, for the most part, stranded. Paratransit enabled her to lead a relatively independent life, with buses picking her up at home and shuttling her to the doctor, the grocery store or a friend's house. Now about the only time Post, 63, gets out of her cramped apartment is the one day a week a bus comes to her senior-citizens complex to bring people to Albertson's.

Unable to walk more than 200 feet at a time without gasping for breath, and afraid she wouldn't see her stop coming, Post said taking a regular city bus remains too frightening. Her anxiety contrasts with CAT's letter of rejection: "Eligibility for ADA (American With Disabilities Act) paratransit service is based on lack of functional ability as a result of a disability that would prevent you from using the fixed-route bus service, not just make it more difficult."

"They have gone crazy. That is not the intent of the law," Post said. "There is supposed to be transportation for the disabled. There are just no words to describe how despicable they really are. And I know I'm not alone."

Indeed. Post's legal action represents merely the most formal charge aimed at the RTC and CAT over Las Vegas' paratransit system. Besides protesting what they see as Draconian eligibility requirements, members of the disabled community complain about CAT's knee-jerk suspension of riders, bus drivers' lack of accountability and an institutional stubbornness in granting the disabled a break.

"If the federal government and the state government can determine that a person's disabled and the condition's not going to get any better, that should be sufficient enough proof (for paratransit eligibility)," Gloria Chaffee said. She is president of the National Federation of the Blind of Nevada.

"If paratransit isn't for the disabled, we don't need it at all," she said. What is the point?"

[STORY BREAK] The RTC created an independent certification process for paratransit riders in January of last year. The intent was twofold: to come into compliance with the ADA and to rub out abuse of the system.

Eighteen months later, RTC officials claim success on both counts. RTC Director Kurt Weinrich said CAT paratransit hews to federal law, providing a complementary service that caters exclusively to disabled riders. Prior to 1997, CAT accepted anyone who requested paratransit. The result: able-bodied seniors looking for a cheap lift to casinos turned paratransit into a sort of public limo service at the expense of those truly in need.

Certifying prospective riders, who now must go through an in-person interview and mobility testing at the Jean Hanna Clark Rehabilitation Center, has cut away the fat. Today, 8,000 Clark County residents ride paratransit, down from 18,000 two years ago. Yet while disabled riders recognize the need for eligibility testing, they accuse the RTC of freezing out dozens of legitimate applicants such as Post.

In its zeal to streamline paratransit, the RTC has become overzealous in interpreting the ADA, according to Paul Martin, spokesman for Nevadans For Equal Access, a coalition working to increase ADA compliance among businesses. Passed in 1990, the law requires that agencies operating a fixed-route bus system offer "comparable complementary paratransit services" for the disabled.

Sounds simple enough -- only there's more to it. The law also stipulates that if a person's handicap makes it "more difficult ... but does not prevent" him from traveling to fixed-route bus stops, there is no guarantee of paratransit eligibility. Advocates for the disabled assert that the RTC wields this clause like a wedge to refuse people paratransit service outright or impose bizarre restrictions on their ridership.

Martin offers himself as an example. He suffers from a form of muscular dystrophy that, when he sweats profusely, causes his body to release chemicals that can briefly paralyze him. Yet certification specialists at the Jean Hanna center gave him conditional eligibility, saying he can ride only when the temperature rises above 90 degrees. With paratransit users required to book rides three days in advance, Martin said he has no choice but to find other transportation.

"How am I going to know three days from now what the weather's going to be? How do they come up with these conditions?" he said. "People with disabilities aren't like other people. You can feel good one day and feel like hell the next, and they don't consider that. It seems ludicrous to me. They've interpreted too much into the ADA."

RTC officials counter that they have fractured neither the letter nor the spirit of the law.

Weinrich described the paratransit proviso as an "afterthought" to the ADA, which he said is more about making fixed-route systems handicapped-accessible than expanding paratransit. He argued that the fixed-route system, by virtue of more buses and nearly perpetual running times, remains more convenient for the disabled, even if it takes them a bit longer to reach a bus stop.

As for the ongoing -- and fully anticipated -- CAT bashing, Weinrich said it typifies the fissure between advocates who believe in mainstreaming the disabled and others who clamor for specialized services.

"The expectation is, 'I have this physical condition, I should have unconditional access to paratransit.' That's not what the law says," Weinrich said. "There's a fundamental unwillingness in some people's minds to accept that."

Monica Schlegel, a Jean Hanna certification specialist, compared paratransit eligibility to qualifying for other social services and noted that a physician's diagnosis does not confer automatic ridership. "People feel they have a disability, therefore they're entitled (to paratransit). It's not an entitlement. It's simply a complement to the fixed route for people who can't use the fixed route."

Although Schlegel hopes the "disabled community will buy into what we're doing," that day may never come. Rather than seeing the RTC as lending a hand to gently nudge them toward the fixed-route system, a good portion of disabled riders feel they're being shoved onto regular buses as a cost-cutting move.

The $1 to $1.50 one-way fare charged to fixed-route passengers matches the cost of providing that service. A one-way ride on paratransit, by contrast, sets CAT back $24; passengers pay $1. The disparity forces RTC to cover paratransit costs with fixed-route revenues and money collected through a quarter-cent transit sales tax.

Critics paint the RTC's rigid eligibility guidelines as an attempt to slash paratransit overhead. They charge that the mobility testing -- conducted in a quiet parking lot cul-de-sac -- in no way approximates the hazards of crossing city streets, in essence making it deceptively easy for people to qualify for fixed-route busing.

The RTC also ignores the perils faced by a person in a wheel chair waiting for a regular bus under the blistering Nevada sun or at 2 a.m. on a deserted street corner, according to Rick Burnham, vice president of the Silver State Blinded Veterans Association. The difficulty of negotiating sidewalks in this decidedly pedestrian-unfriendly town and the inability of the visually impaired to see fixed-route bus signs makes paratransit the best option for most disabled people, he said.

"It could be raining out there, and you've got elderly people in a wheelchair or with a walker waiting for a (regular) bus. That's insanity," Burnham, who is legally blind and uses paratransit, said.

Economics plays a part in certifying riders, Weinrich conceded, but only in the sense that without an eligibility policy, paratransit would bankrupt RTC coffers. In addition, he pointed out that until the RTC finishes canvassing the county to make sure all bus stops have curb cuts and are otherwise handicapped- accessible -- a process that could take at least another year -- CAT will continue to waive conditions placed on riders' eligibility.

Bruce Turner, a CAT principal planner, said: "We're absolutely not trying to save money by trying to get rid of people who used to be qualified. It's not only not humane, it's foolish. It puts us in a position to be sued."

[STORY BREAK] Cerebral palsy has ravaged Jane Nielsen's body. Aside from her left arm and hand, she has little muscle control below the shoulders. An electric wheelchair and paratransit are her portals to the outside world.

Under CAT policy, riders who rack up three no-shows -- failure to appear at a pick-up spot at the designated time -- within 30 days face a 15-day suspension. In early March, Nielsen received a letter from CAT informing her she was about to lose her riding privileges. She recalled missing the bus on one occasion, but on the other two days cited by CAT, Nielsen had friends waiting with her. They vouched that paratransit never showed.

It didn't matter. CAT planned to boot Nielsen anyway. Then, the day before her suspension kicked in, a friend's letter to the editor detailing Nielsen's plight appeared in the Sun. Nielsen got a call the next morning from a CAT worker telling her the sanctions had been deep-sixed.

"I was unfairly railroaded," Nielsen, 31, said.

The speech therapist for the Clark County School District added, "I wouldn't have been able to go anywhere for two, three weeks. I could understand a day or two, but they have to look at the individual's situation."

Nielsen voices a lament familiar to other paratransit users who insist that, no matter the circumstances, no matter how many friends, co-workers or doctors attest to a rider's being in the right place at the right time, CAT always takes the driver's side. They contend that in cracking down on no-shows, the RTC and CAT too readily punish riders while disregarding drivers' mistakes -- an exasperating dilemma for people such as Nielsen who cannot use the fixed-route system.

CAT notifies paratransit users that drivers may show up as much as 15 minutes before or after the arranged pickup time. But while riders could be marooned for half an hour or longer, drivers usually stick around for no more than 10 minutes. Lingering would throw off their schedules, according to RTC Paratransit Manager Ron Davis.

Too often, however, it appears that buses never reach riders. Martin, who owns a specially-equipped van, and his son have fetched people who were abandoned by paratransit "numerous times."

Raymond Bishop, an accounting clerk for the state's Division of Child and Family Services Treatment, is blind and has a heart condition. After he moved into a new office last year, paratransit drivers kept pulling up to his old one, resulting in several no-shows. On the verge of CAT suspending him, Bishop managed to clear up the matter by having co-workers write to the RTC on his behalf. The episode nearly cost Bishop his job because he relies on paratransit to take him to work every day.

"It's really demeaning," Tina Schafer said. Like her son, Joe, she has muscular dystrophy. In March, Joe received a no-show despite waiting for 90 minutes outside a health clinic with an attendant, who later wrote to the RTC vouching for him.

"You already have to prove that you're cripple enough, poor enough, and then they blame you when their drivers don't show up," she said.

A spokesman for ATC/Vancom, the company that supplies drivers to CAT, referred questions to the RTC.

While maintaining that the majority of no-shows are eventually wiped off riders' records on appeal, Weinrich admitted the paratransit system has its share of glitches. One concern: high driver turnover. Drawn away by better-paying jobs elsewhere in Las Vegas, one-third of paratransit drivers -- who earn a couple of bucks an hour less than their fixed-route counterparts -- will leave this year.

That churn can make for an unreliable, uncaring work force, a paratransit driver said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"Some drivers just don't go (to a destination). They call in and say they were there, and they weren't," she said.

"These are people just looking for a paycheck and nothing more. They just don't have a lot of sympathy."

Less deliberate gaffes and delays occur more frequently, the driver added. She faults CAT for sending individual drivers back and forth across town instead of confining them to a specific area. Several other cities, including Seattle and Denver, employ a quadrant transit system to reduce the number of miles each bus travels. CAT has rejected the concept, convinced that asking disabled riders to switch buses would be too much of an inconvenience, Turner said.

Another persistent problem involves CAT's habit of simultaneously routing two paratransit buses to the same neighborhood -- in one instance, all the way out in Boulder City -- to pick up two people, the driver said. Such double-dipping may leave someone else without a ride, she said.

"It's screwed up. There's a serious problem. There's no efficiency. None. And lately I've been told that the buses are full. They're not full. The only time they're full is when they go somewhere like Opportunity Village."

Last-minute cancellations, bus breakdowns and drivers quitting or calling in sick all wreak havoc on scheduling and itineraries, Davis explained. Some 75 percent of paratransit rides are shared, he said, although often only two or three people will ride on an 18-person capacity bus since CAT wants to hold passenger trips to 90 minutes or less.

To better referee the "rider said/driver said" skirmishes, the RTC plans to install a new telecommunications system that will enable CAT to track by satellite its 124 paratransit and 275 fixed-route buses. CAT also intends to offer mobility training to disabled riders to help more of them use fixed-route busing.

Still, for a transit system named one of the nation's 10 best last year, some in the disabled community suggest RTC and CAT officials could use a bit of training themselves -- in sensitivity.

Ralph E. Steele, confined to a wheelchair since being injured in a helicopter crash two decades ago, sits on the Older Americans/Disabilities Transportation Advisory Committee, which reports riders' worries to the RTC. He gives CAT generally high marks and praises paratransit for affording him a measure of freedom, something all too rare in the lives of many disabled people.

But when it comes to denying potential riders eligibility or leveling suspensions, Steele said the RTC "has to have a heart" for those who in many respects already feel cut off from the mainstream.

"We're not asking for pity, we're not asking for sympathy," Steele said. "We're asking for compassion. We're asking them to do the right thing."

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