WFHB Bloomington Community Radio
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Bloomington’s Disability community introduces itself to the new city council, a new rule is proposed by the Department of Transportation for passengers with disabilities who travel via airline, The Food and Drug Administration renews a campaign to ban a device long used in a Massachusetts institution, and we talk with Bloomington Human Rights Director Michael Shermis on the latest developments in city Disability policy.
Good evening, a brief reminder that April is Autism Awareness and Acceptance Month.
In local news, new members of the Bloomington City Council were introduced to the primary Disability Rights organizations in the city for the first time. Lesley Davis, the chairperson of the Bloomington Council for Community Accessibility, a volunteer organization that works with businesses and the city government to improve accessibility was the first to speak.
Davis was then followed by Karen Willison. Willison is co-president of Mobility Aids Lending Library, a non-profit organization founded last year providing with assistive devices including canes, wheelchairs, and walkers to Bloomingtonians with Disabilities who could not otherwise afford them.
Image courtesy of Bloom Magazine Image description:A shot of Mobility Aids Lending Library Founder and co-president Karen Willison, wearing a light blue shirt and sitting in a wheelchair and has long long hair. To Willison’s left is a black dog with its tongue out.
Council President Isabel Piedmont Smith asked organization members about whether progress had been made to upgrade sidewalks in the city to ensure safe passage for Bloomingtonians in wheelchairs. Bloomington Human Rights and Government Liaison for the Bloomington Council for Community Accessibility Michael Shermis, responded:
Councilmember Kate Rosenbarger then spoke about the importance of working with disability organizations to improve sidewalks in the city, particularly how to do so with sidewalks that have already been designated as historical.
Rosenbenbarger asked City Human Rights Director Shermis if the council had been briefed on a recent historical designation of sidewalks in the past.
Image courtesy of:The United States Department of Transportation Image Description:A shot of Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg with black hair and wearing a black coat, white shirt, and blue tie. Buttigieg stands in front of an american flag to his left and the Department of Transportation flag to his right.
In news from the federal government, a new rule was proposed in February by the Department Of Transportation to improve how airline staff handle Wheelchairs for travelers with disabilities, a rule first announced by Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg last July. On February 29, the Department of Transportation announced the full rule in its final form. At a roundtable last July with Disability Rights Activists celebrating the 33rd anniversary of the Americans With Disabilities Act, which prohibits discrimination towards persons with disabilities in all forms, Buttigieg cited examples of the difficulty that passengers in wheelchairs disabilities may encounter when traveling via flight and described the latest actions by the Department of Transportation in improving these conditions. This is the latest development in the Department of Transportation’s attempts to make airlines more accessible, with the Department having drafted a bill of rights for disabled airline passengers in July 2022, the first such document in American history. While the Airline Carriers Access Act of 1986 already classifies discrimination against passengers with disabilities by airlines as illegal, it seems more enforcement is needed. In data obtained from the Department of Transportation released last month, a total of 11,527 wheelchairs were “mishandled”, an increase from 2022 when the total was 10,449. The new rules tackle three areas: Penalties, Assistance, and standards of airplane construction. Under the penalties section, any airline that mistreats a wheelchair has violated the Air Carrier Access Act, which may result in the Department of Transportation levying “penalties against said airline.” The section goes on to state that in the event of a wheelchair being damaged, the airline must inform the impacted passenger that it will pay for the wheelchair’s repair within a “reasonable timeframe” while providing the passenger an option to borrow a wheelchair in the meantime. As for Assistance, the rule recommends “annual hands-on training of airline employees” when helping passengers with disabilities and to ensure a passenger’s wheelchair reaches their intended location within 24 hours.” Finally, the rule proposes that passengers be informed by airline staff if their wheelchairs cannot fit on the plane they intend on traveling in and when their wheelchairs have been placed in and removed from the plane.
Image Courtesy of: The Judge Rotenberg Center Image description:A green field features several light blue sculptures with a concrete parking lot ahead and a red brick building in front of the parking lot
In national news, since its founding in 1971, the Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton, Massachusetts has served as an institution for individuals with developmental disabilities. To help patients stop dangerous behaviors, the center uses aversive therapy, in which a patient experiences a form of discomfort given by a therapist if the patient engages in perceived inappropriate behaviors. The goal is for the patient to recognize that continued occurrences of such behaviors will result in further exposure to the discomfort given by the therapist, leading them to stop the behavior.
However the Judge Rotenberg Center is the only institution in the country performing aversive therapy with a device known as the Graduated Electronic Decelerator (GED). The device is usually worn by a patient on their bodies and, if the patient exhibits behaviors the staff deems inappropriate, an electric shock is given to the patient via remote control. The center states the device is only used as a last resort if a patient continues to engage in “self-injurious or violent behavior” after prior attempts at prevention have failed.
However several incidents at the center have come to light demonstrating that usage of the device is ineffective at reducing harmful behaviors, left lasting physical and psychological scars on patients, and has often been used as an initial form of treatment. At this time, the device is permitted for 45-50 patients at the center. Despite the United Nations classifying the device as a form of torture in 2013, legislative Efforts to ban the center from continuing this treatment have been unsuccessful, with a Food and Drug Administration ban of the device in March 2020 being overturned by the DC Circuit Court of Appeals one year later because the ban went beyond the FDA’s authority. Two years later, Congress passed the Food and Drug Omnibus Reform Act in December 2022, expanding the FDA’s authority to “ban devices that can be used in situations proven to cause substantial risk of illness or injury.” And just this week, the Food and Drug Administration unveiled a new attempt at a ban on the devices. According to a statement by FDA’s Product Evaluation and Quality office, the director Owen Faris said, “These devices present a number of psychological risks including depression, anxiety, worsening of underlying symptoms, development of post-traumatic stress disorder, and physical risks such as pain, burns, and tissue damage.” On May 28, the department will close public comment on the rule, at which time, it will decide whether or not to proceed with the ban.
And now an interview with Michael Shermis, Human Rights Director and Disability Coordinator for the city of Bloomington on the latest disability legislation in the city.
Image Courtesy of:Bloom Magazine Image Description:A man with glasses wearing a grey shirt and black pants sits in front of two posters with one displaying Martin Luther King. The quote above King reads: “Life’s most persistent question is what are you doing for others?” Below the king poster is a white poster with the universal wheelchair logo.
