Girl Talk: Disability And Accessibility - Part 1

It’s official, GIRL TALK is my newest series on this blog. I am so excited and honored to interview some incredible women that I look up to about what it’s like to be them. First up is someone I have known practically my entire life. Her name is Danielle Frank and she quickly became on of my mentors/big sisters in LPA. She has let nothing stop her from being an advocate for the little person and disabled communities both within LPA itself and in her day-to-day life as a disability services coordinator. I am so thankful to Danielle for taking the time to talk to me. In part I, we discuss our world’s current state of accessibility, what inspired her to pursue a career in disability services, struggles with SEPTA and the little people voice in the disability rights movement.

JILLIAN: Please start by introducing yourself. 

DANIELLE: My name is Danielle Frank, I live outside of Philadelphia. Like you, I have achondroplasia. I’m 30 years old, a lifetime member of Little People of America (LPA), and I’m a college academic advisor. 

JILLIAN: I want to talk to you about accessibility, disability services, and LPA because you served on the board. Do you feel the world as it is today is accessible for people with disabilities, specifically little people?  

DANIELLE: No, I do not believe it is fully accessible. Is it better than it was in 1990 when the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) became law? Of course, it is. I think that there are companies and organizations that are trying to make things more accessible. But, in 2020, I shouldn’t be getting excited about seeing a building that has a ramp or certain features, I should be expecting it. We still get excited when a company or organization is becoming more accessible when we shouldn’t have to. That should be the norm. 

JILLIAN: Exactly. 

DANIELLE: Accessibility sometimes has to happen because people are forced to do it from a law or public demand. Is it better than it was 30 years ago when I was born? Yes. But, at the same time, accessibility is more than a ramp- just because a building installs a ramp doesn’t mean it is accessible. There are people with intellectual disabilities, there are people with vision or hearing difficulties and they all have different needs of accessibility. As someone with a physical disability, I’m speaking from what I see. But, I’m sure if you asked 100 people with disabilities, you would get 100 different answers. 

JILLIAN: Do you feel that the ADA is effective in protecting the rights of people with disabilities? 

DANIELLE: I think it’s effective when people follow it. But, again, there is something called undue hardship that a lot of people try to take advantage of so they don’t have to abide by the law. Or, they’ll say “We’re grandfathered in, the ADA doesn’t apply to us.” Going back to the first question for a moment: When we look at a handicap bathroom, yes it might fit my scooter. But, the toilet is so high or the sink is too high and it’s really not little people friendly. People will say, “Well, we made sure your scooter fits in the bathroom, you’re good to go” and my response is, “But, it’s still not accessible for me.” That’s why I’m so in favor of universal design- we need to incorporate it so it includes everyone. It’s one thing to have a ramp in front of your building, but how much further are you going? For little people it’s a double challenge because whether we use mobility devices is one thing but it’s also our height and things aren’t made with our height in mind. 

JILLIAN: Exactly. What inspired you to work in disability services? 

DANIELLE: So, my job title right now is an academic advisor. I am also the disability service coordinator at the college that I work at. I never thought about this career until I got to college. I was originally planning on becoming a high school guidance counselor because I had such a great guidance counselor in middle school who inspired me to pursue that work. When I got to college I had an incredible disability services coordinator and an office to go to that could really help with my needs. It was also during this time that I became more disabled; I had more physical challenges brought onto me due to multiple spine surgeries. So, I realized how important it was [to students with a disability] to have a resource like a disability services office in college and a coordinator and counselor who could guide them, empower them to do well in college. And, to be honest, one of the other reasons why I chose it was that I knew it was a field where I couldn’t be discriminated against. Higher ed is an environment that is inclusive to people of different backgrounds, race, sexuality, cultures and disabilities. I knew that I would be in a safe work space. Moreover, I had a unique perspective that I could bring to the table that maybe others could not. 

JILLIAN: Speaking for myself, while in college I found disability services were helpful in some aspects but not in others.

As someone who is on the other side, who works in the disability services office, how do you judge their effectiveness in actually helping students with disabilities? 

DANIELLE: I think, and I’ve talked about this with other counselors at different conferences, that there are people who are truly disabled and truly need the resources, whether they have disabilities you can see or invisible disabilities. And then, and it’s unfortunate when it happens, there are students who take advantage of the system, who technically do not need the services or want something that is taking away from somebody who truly needs it. 

For example, even though we are both little people, our needs are totally different. But, because they want to make sure everything is fair, there exist policies and rules that really are not fair to all students, but the coordinators have to follow them for legality purposes or to make sure that their offices are not overextending themselves. Unfortunately, there is a lot of red tape and a lot of “trying to make things fair” by putting rules and systems in place, but those rules and systems do not always work for every student. 

JILLIAN: I know that, pre-pandemic, you would commute to and from work on SEPTA (Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority). Can you talk about your experiences with them? 

DANIELLE: Oh SEPTA, they love me.

Here it goes...I have a scooter and I use the regional rail to and from the suburbs of Philadelphia to downtown Philadelphia. Unfortunately, SEPTA has their idea of what is an accessible train and what is not. Now, I believe in the social model of disability: that the environment needs to accommodate the disabled person. And, what’s interesting is that SEPTA has a couple of different train cars- some were builty thirty or forty years ago and some are new. The newer cars have automatic doors, digital signing, more audio cues so people with visual disabilities can hear what stop they are at. There are also wide enough spaces for people to have their scooters, wheelchairs or other mobility devices. Unfortunately, SEPTA still uses their older cars which they think are “accessible” but, in reality, are not. In these cars there is a big hump to get over to the one car and I need someone to push me and some conductors do not want to help me. They will say, “I can’t touch your scooter.” My response is, “Well, your train is not accessible.”

I feel bad for people with visual disabilities because half of the time, with the older trains, the audio does not work so they cannot tell where their stop is. Moreover, somebody who is hard of hearing may not be able to see the signs because there isn’t adequate signage [in the older cars]. Yet, somehow SEPTA thinks these trains are accessible and they are not. What makes it more frustrating is that they have these newer cars they are not using and I do not know why. I could have a great day with SEPTA if it’s a new train and everything is working. I can get on my scooter with no assistance and I am good to go. But, with the older train models, I am helpless half the time. I have to rely on the conductor who I’m hoping will not be an a$$ and actually help me get on and off the train. 

I had one really bad experience with SEPTA. On the older trains, they have to line up with the platform a certain way in order to access the ramp. One night it was pitch black and they did not line up with the ramp. They said to me, “We have to take you to the next stop.” I told them, “I can’t go to the next stop. I don’t have that luxury. You need to drop me off here,” and they really did not care. They just kept going and dropped me off at the next station. Luckily, my ride was still able to pick me up. They (SEPTA) have the attitude of “You, as a disabled person, should feel privileged that you can even ride a train” rather than “We value you as a customer, as a rider. How can we make this an enjoyable experience for you?” And, that’s that.

JILLIAN: That’s just unbelievable to me. It frustrates me that, when I took the train to work, I would see able-bodied people sitting in the reserved handicapped seats, refusing to get up for someone who needs to sit there. Because I can stand, I will if necessary. However, this one time I was elbowed in the head and the person made me feel like it was my fault for having my head where they wanted to place their elbow. They made me feel like I was in the way of their ability to stand comfortably and I didn’t know who to go to. Who do you go to when the conductors are not helpful and how do you respond? 

DANIELLE: There are some nice SEPTA conductors that I have gotten to know because of how often I ride the train. At the end of the day it comes down to training and education. If you’re not working with disabled people or if your company/organization is not valuing people with disabilities, you are going to be accidentally ignorant, rather than by choice. 

Also, with accessibility, when I talk about the newer trains, people think that we only have to accommodate the person in the wheelchair. Accessibility also applies to parents with strollers, the elderly, people with invisible or temporary disabilities. But society does not see this. We just think about the person who uses a wheelchair and, because we don’t see many people who use wheelchairs in everyday life, we think accessibility is not that important. It’s more than that. 

JILLIAN: Touching on that, do you feel that little people are being seen and heard in the disability rights movement? 

DANIELLE: I feel like little people, as a community, have a lot of work to do. I appreciate people like you, Rebecca Cokley, Cara Reedy, and so many others in our community who are really doing great things for the disability community as a whole. They are really trying to educate our own community about disability. However, you know people and I know people in the little people community that do not identify as having a disability. Unfortunately, I think there is a lot of discrimination in our own organization. As someone who uses a mobility device pretty much full time, I notice that I’m not as included as much at conferences compared to other people who don’t use mobility devices or have less physical challenges. There is a lot of work that needs to be done in our community before we can do great things in the disability community as a whole.

Stay tuned for part ii