When you talk to most people about barriers experienced by people with disabilities, they tend to think of the physical barriers. We envision accessible parking spaces, ramps into public buildings or the large stall at the back of the public restroom. And we miss the point.
Don’t get me wrong: These are all important aspects of accessibility. But they are the tip of the iceberg. When you really start looking at all the places we fail to create accessibility for people with disabilities, you begin to realize that the disabilities are within our society, not within the person.
When you talk to a person with a disability about barriers, the list is probably going to be much different. Transportation is often at the top of the list, with housing either a close second or battling for first.
In Southwest Colorado, those two issues are entwined. Affordable housing is more prevalent in areas outside city limits. And if you live outside the city limits, you have limited (or no) access to transportation without a personal vehicle. Finding the magic combination of affordable housing in a location served by public transportation is nothing short of a miracle.
Another popular item on the list is employment. Even before the economic downturn, the availability of meaningful jobs for people with significant disabilities was limited. According to the Department of Labor, 68 percent of individuals with disabilities are unemployed in an average year. The lack of steady employment at a livable wage is a huge barrier to purchasing a home, owning a car or participating in myriad activities that contribute to a happy, fulfilled life.
The current median list price of a Durango home is $399,000, while average rent is $1,950 per month. Livable wage in La Plata County is reportedly $12.40 an hour. (Though I haven’t quite figured out how to pay $1,950 in rent with a monthly gross income of $2,108.) A minimum-wage job won’t suffice. Nor will the $733 per month from SSI that is the sole source of income for many people with intellectual disabilities.
What won’t show up in the data are the barriers created by attitudes. It is difficult to capture the discrimination experienced by people who don’t look or act in a way that conforms. Even in our little corner of the world, there are daily examples of unintentional discrimination.
Over the years, I’ve heard community members complain about adults with disabilities attending R-rated movies, heard business owners say that they “don’t work with those people” and have seen people shunned and shamed for simply being who they are. Ableism is just as ugly and harmful as racism and sexism and yet remains socially acceptable behavior. Our societal norms have to change in order for the barriers to be overcome.
What we are doing now is keeping far too many people with intellectual and physical disabilities impoverished, isolated and dependent. What we are doing now isn’t working.
Tara Kiene is the director of case management with Community Connections Inc.
