Day in Washington Podcast #14(b) – Senate ADA Restoration Hearing
Day in Washington- The Disability Policy Podcast explores and discusses various aspects of disability policy. Each episode will cover a specific issue within disability, and/or a disability-related news article. These 8-10 minute podcasts offer an easy to understand introduction to disability policy and resources for those interested in further study. You can find the text of each podcast in the comments. If you have difficulty downloading the podcast, please right-click and save it to your computer for playback.
Note: Due to the fact that much of the audio is taken from a webcast, please note that there may be inconsistencies in the audio quality.
Episode Summary:
This week’s podcast covers the Senate Health, Education and Labor Committee’s hearing on ADA Restoration. Within this podcast are snippets of audio from the hearing. My apologies for the late posting but I wanted to post this with a transcript.
Audio File: Day in Washington Podcast #14(b) – ADA Restoration Senate Hearing
Show Notes
- Introduction, Date of Podcast
- Introduction to the ADA Restoration Senate Hearing (Senator Harkin)
- Senator Harkin (again)
- John Kemp
- Dick Thornburg
- Camille Olson
- Senator Murray
- Chai Feldblum
- Closing and Contact information
- Disclaimer
Resources
ADA Restoration Hearing on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Website
Video Webcast of November 15, 2007 ADA Restoration Act Hearing
Please note that the video is not captioned.
Day in Washington Podcast #11 – ADA Restoration House Hearing
Day in Washington Podcast #5 – ADA Restoration
American Association of People with Disabilities ADA Restoration Blog
Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities ADA Restoration Page - Includes Written Testimony of Additional Supporters
Day in Washington – Podcast #14b (November 20, 2007)
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to a Day in Washington. Day in Washington is your disability policy podcast covering legislative issues of interest to the disability community. We also spotlight specific bills and other related news articles. I’m your host, Day Al-Mohamed working to make sure you stay informed. This is Podcast #14(b) for Tuesday, November 20, 2007.
This week’s podcast covers the Senate ADA Restoration hearing. On November 15, the Senate Health, Education and Labor Committee held a hearing on ADA Restoration (H.R. 3195 and S. 1881 in Senate).
Again, as in the House hearing, rather than summarize what was said myself I thought it might be meaningful to hear the testimony directly from the witnesses. Included are audio clips of public testimony from some of the witnesses. Although Steven Orr, the pharmacist with diabetes provided testimony, it did not differ significantly from his House hearing testimony and as it is included in that previous podcast, I decided against repeating it
First, I would like to start with the opening words and introduction from Senator Harkin.
“The ADA was one of the landmark civil rights laws of the 2th century. Americans take enormous pride in the progress we made in advancing the laws four goals for people with disabilities: equality of opportunity, full participation, independent living and economic opportunity. Nobody wants to go backwards, but the harsh reality is that today we are going backwards. In a series of decisions, the supreme court has narrowed the ADA in ways that directly contradict the clear intent of Congress. When we wrote the ADA we took the definition of Disability from Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. A statute that was well litigated and well understood. Conditions that were commonly understood to be a disability included: amputation, diabetes, epilepsy, intellectual disabilities, bipolar disorders, multiple sclerosis.
The committee report says: Someone with a disability should be assessed without regard to the availability of mitigating measures such as reasonable accommodations or auxiliary aids.
Yet in a series of decisions in 1999 the court ruled that mitigating measures – prosthetics, medication, hearing aids and so on must be considered in determining if a person has a disability under ADA.”
He goes on to discuss how the law has continued to alter the definition of disability to where it is impacting not only disabilities such as epilepsy or diabetes but has expanded further.
“It has gotten so bad that just last spring a lower court concluded that a person with what is commonly called mental retardation was not disabled under the ADA.
In another case an individual with epilepsy who had “ONLY” had one 15 second seizure a week was not considered to be disabled.
In yet another recent case a woman missing her right forearm and hand was ruled to not be disabled under the ADA.”
The first witness to provide testimony was John Kemp. He very clearly lays out the issue at hand.
“I have no hands and feet. The Senate and House reports clearly gave me the right to challenge discrimination on the basis of disability without regard to the availability of mitigating measures, as in my case, my prostheses. The focus of the ADA is not on whether, with my prostheses I can comb my hair, brush my hair, or focus major life activities. The focus of the ADA is on whether I can prove that an employer denied me a job or a promotion unlawfully on the basis of disability.”
Following John was Dick Thornburg who had been the Attorney General at the time of the passage of the original ADA.
“Despite the substantial progress, the ADA has not been as successful as expected at protecting some individuals from employment discrimination. The problem is a direct result of judicial interpretation or misinterpretation of the definition of who qualifies as an individual with a disability under the statute.
Under the three 1999 Supreme Court decisions in Sutton, Murphy and Kirkenburg cases, as well as a series of lower court decisions, the definition of disability ahs become unduly restrictive and often difficult to prove so that millions of Americans we all INTENDED to protect from discrimination including people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, bipolar disorder, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy and diabetes are no longer covered by the laws protections.
I don’t think there are any among us who think that these conditions do not qualify as disabilities, yet this is what the courts have in effect concluded over and over again since 1999 and what now needs to be rectified by the Congress.”
Camille Olson spoke on behalf of the opposition. Regardless of whether or not one agrees with her position (and I don’t), let me say, she was well prepared and very knowledgeable on the subject matter. This hearing was an excellent opportunity to get a better understanding of the opposing perspective to ADA restoration.
“What would be the practical effect of defining an ADA disability as an impairment? It is telling that no one has provided the committee with a list of conditions that would not be covered under Senate bill 1881. I ask you to consider what impairment wouldn’t be excluded. Employers will find themselves addressing a combination of requests from individuals with the flu, with poison ivy, ankle sprains, stomach aches, the occasional headache, a tooth ache and a myriad of other minor medical conditions that go far beyond any reasonable concept of disability. There is no limitation on the definition of disability in Senate bill 1881 and as a result it should not be adopted as the new definition of disability under the ADA.
Second, preventing employers from considering mitigating measures in both their positive and negative effects in determining whether someone has a disability will label the vast majority of us sitting in the room today and the vast majority of us in America as disabled under the ADA.”
Although she could not stay for the entire hearing, Senator Murray was in attendance and spoke about her very personal interest as well as professional interest in this legislation.
“As you know, I grew up in a household with my father in a wheelchair for most of my life – he had multiple sclerosis. I so well remember not being able to go anywhere unless we called to find out what the parking was like, whether there were curbs, how the doors opened, what the bathrooms were like, whether a table was going to be there. It meant literally that my dad was housebound so many of the times.
The ADA made a huge difference in my family’s life and I just know that if my father was alive today and he was hearing of the challenges of people today, I know he would not want to go back to where we were when I was growing up, so this is a critical issue.
Let me just point out that as a member of the veteran’s committee I fought very hard to make sure we remember the high number of men and women who are coming home today with mental health problems, post traumatic stress syndrome, TBI.
I am deeply concerned that unless we do make some changes in this law we are going to impact the very men and women who have gone to fight for us and who are coming home, as our warriors and are going to be impacted by the restrictions of the court decisions. I think that is critical.”
And the final panelist Chai Feldblum, who played a significant role in the drafting of the original ADA and whose knowledge and expertise have been invaluable to those working towards ADA restoration. As you’ll hear, she has an uncanny ability to speak to the heart of the issue and directly address those issues and concerns brought up by those opposing the ADA.
“If you come back from Iraq with an amputated leg and you are fitted with a prosthetic limb, which would be some of the people you and Senator Murray mentioned, but you don’t adapt very well to that limb, which by the way, under current case law means you are SEVERELY limited in your ability to walk or run, you’ll be covered under the ADA.
But if, God forbid, you are lucky enough to adapt well to your prosthetic limb, which thankfully hundreds of veterans are being able to do, based on developments in technology. And you walk and run just fine, but you aren’t hired because an employer doesn’t want someone with a prosthetic limb in the workplace; you’re not covered under the ADA. The same goes for an impairment that can be treated with medication.”
She goes on to close with the following:
“So in conclusion, let me address a concern raised by Ms. Olson in her testimony and also here that the approach of S. 1881 will undermine the cause of people with disabilities because the law will no longer cover the “truly disabled” only.
Oh my God! Look at the number of people with disabilities in this room. They don’t believe the bill sets back their cause. Why not? Because they understand there is no set of the “truly disabled” and then the rest of us. We all exist along a spectrum of ability.
It is true that many of us will never experience discrimination because of our physical or mental impairment, while others of us might. But it isn’t because some of us are “truly disabled” and others of us are not. It is because of the TYPE of discrimination that some of us will suffer and others of us will not. There is no “us” and “them.” There is simply a vision of equality and justice.
And there just isn’t much I can say after that. I strongly encourage you to view the webcast or read the transcript. These audio clips are from the witness testimony, however, as in most hearings, there are a lot of details that are brought to light in the question and answer period.
CLOSING
And that is it for this week’s edition of Day in Washington. For links to more information, please check the show notes. Please feel free to contact me at http://www.dayinwashington.com regarding comments or suggestions. I’d love to hear from you, but for now, this is your host, Day reminding you to stay well and stay informed.
EPILOGUE
Music for this podcast was provided by the podsafe music network @ podsafemusicnetwork.com. The music was composed and performed by 2012 and can be found at http://www.twentytwelverecords.com.
Any opinions and perspectives expressed in this podcast should not be taken as the official stance of any group or organization affiliated with the host. In addition, none of the facts, data, or grammar have been checked for accuracy.
Thank you for listening.
[...] Day in Washington Podcast #14(b) – Senate ADA Restoration Hearing Nov 20 ‘07, Day in Washington. Follow the link for a podcast covering the Nov 15 Senate hearing on the ADA Restoration Act. You can either listen to the podcast or scroll down to the bottom of the page at Day in Washington to read the transcript. You will also see links here to older podcasts on the ADA Restoration Act; Day in Washington generally provides transcripts for these podcasts in the comments area so deaf people (or people with central auditory processing disorders, etc.) can simply scroll down the page to see them. [...]
[...] Day in Washington Podcast #14(b) – Senate ADA Restoration Hearing (November 15, 2007) [...]
[...] Day in Washington Podcast #14(b) – Senate ADA Restoration Hearing (November 15, 2007) [...]
Bipolar Disorder A Depressive Symptoms in Teens…
Bipolar disorder is a mental illness that causes extreme mood swings. This condition is also called manic-depressive illness. It may be caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. Bipolar disorder is a brain disorder that causes unusual shifts in a pe…
[...] Day in Washington Podcast #14(b) – Senate ADA Restoration Hearing (November 15, 2007) [...]
[...] Day in Washington Podcast #14(b) – Senate ADA Restoration Hearing (November 15, 2007) [...]