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Mesa Vista door proves difficult for wheelchair-bound

Accessibility Services door up to standards

by K. F. Ortega

Daily Lobo

For UNM student Betty Parish to gain access to the computer pods inside of Accessibility Services, she must contort herself into a pretzel-like position.

She carefully positions her motorized scooter to the left of the door, slowly opens it with her right hand, props it open with her left foot and inches her scooter inside while praying her exposed left foot doesn't get caught when the door shuts.

Parish sent a letter, dated Aug. 8, to Juan Candelaria, director of Accessibility Services, and to the Office of Equal Opportunity, explaining the problem and suggested an electric door be installed.

Mesa Vista Hall's Accessibility Services helps UNM students with disabilities and makes sure the University complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act. It also provides services such as proctoring, transcription and assisting computer technology.

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The act, passed in 1990, also provides legislation for buildings access for disabled people.

Parish, who has been using Accessibility Services since 1999, said that after she was nearly injured last fall while attempting to navigate the door, she wondered why the department that provides services to disabled students does not have an electric door.

Candelaria said he believes that the problem with the door is not that it is too hard to open, but that it closes too quickly, before students can get inside.

"It swings back pretty fast," said Tyler Mayhew, another UNM student who is in a wheelchair.

The door does meet the act's standards said Joe McKinney, University planner with the Department of Facility Planning. He has measured the door twice and it requires only six pounds of force to open, which is less than the eight pounds of force the act and the University's own stricter requirements mandate, he said.

There are reasons why the door has not been replaced, but he said money is not one of them.

"It's not a monetary thing," McKinney said. "But it's felt that if it meets code then we don't put them in because it's $1,700 dollars and then $50 a month after that."

Parish said in her experience, disabled people do not fight for their rights as much as those who are not, but she hopes that the situation can be resolved to everyone's benefit.

"The door may be in compliance with the ADA standards, but not the needs of the students," Parish said.

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