• An Anton Media Group Special •
HEALTHY LIVING AUGUST 12 - 18, 2015
Anniversary For Americans With Disabilities Act The day the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) passed in 1990, U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin delivered a speech from the Senate floor in a way most of his colleagues didn’t understand. Harkin, the bill’s sponsor, used sign language for the benefit of his brother who was deaf and had taught Harkin this lesson: “People should be judged on the basis of their abilities and not on the basis of their disabilities.” With the country marking the ADA’s 25th anniversary this summer, Brandi Rarus, a former Miss Deaf America, remembers how important it was for people with disabilities to make it known they would no longer allow others to set limits on what they could achieve. “Those of us with disabilities face many barriers,” said Rarus, coauthor with Gail Harris of the book Finding Zoe: A Deaf Woman’s Story of Identity, Love and Adoption. “Some of those are unavoidable. I can’t listen to the
radio as I drive to work in the morning. Often, because of communication barriers, I have to work twice as hard as a hearing person. Instead of taking me five minutes to make a doctor’s appointment, it takes me 10.” But some barriers are avoidable, Rarus said. And that’s why the ADA has played such an important role in people’s lives for the last 25 years. The ADA prohibits discrimination against qualified individuals with disabilities when it comes to employment issues. The ADA also requires employers to make reasonable accommodations for a disability unless it causes an “undue hardship.” Harris, a professional storyteller and Rarus’ coauthor, said that although Rarus is deaf, her life struggles are similar to everyone’s. “We can all relate to finding our place in the world and fitting in, about self-acceptance, about
Brandi Rarus being judged and judging others and how we must look past all that to fulfill our dreams,” said Harris. The U.S. Department of Labor officials said many
concerns about the ADA never materialized. According to the department: • Complying isn’t expensive. The majority of workers with disabilities do not need accommodations, and for those who do, the cost is usually minimal. In fact, 57 percent of accommodations cost nothing, according to the Job Accommodation Network, a service from the Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy. • Lawsuits have not flooded the courts. The majority of ADA employment-related disputes are resolved through informal negotiation or mediation. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which enforces the ADA’s employment provisions, investigates the merits of each case and offers alternatives to litigation. The number of ADA employmentrelated cases represents a tiny
see DISABILITIES on page 20A
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