Breaking Down Travel Barriers
all to confirm the plane and hotel reservations. Arrange for someone to bring in the mail and feed the cats. Get to the airport with time to spare. Pack tire patches and Allen wrench.
No, this isn't an auto mechanic's travel-planning list. It belongs to the Justice Department's Sally Conway, who travels for the government about 10 times a year - with her wheelchair.
Luckily, patching tires and fixing damaged brakes are not everyday occurrences. But federal travelers who have disabilities must make some plans and face some challenges others don't.
People with disabilities make up more than 7 percent of the federal workforce, according to the Office of Personnel Management. And as employment options for people with disabilities expand, medical technology advances and the baby boom ages, those numbers are likely to increase.
They're also growing because the government wants them to. Vice President Al Gore asked OPM to develop a plan to bring more people with disabilities into the federal workforce. The agency recently released two publications: a plan and a guide to employing people with disabilities in the federal government. "As an employer, we must make any and all reasonable adjustments or alterations that would enable a qualified person with a disability to apply for a job, perform their job responsibilities, or enjoy equal benefits and privileges of federal employment," said OPM Director Janice Lachance in a December speech.
Making Accommodations
Several laws already require employers, public and private, to provide access to and accommodations in the workplace so people with disabilities can do their jobs. That means more than voice-recognition software, ramps and interpreters - it means federal workers whose jobs require travel should get what they need to do that travel.
Some need little more than flexibility in the rules. Ed Exum, who works for the Environmental Protection Agency in Athens, Ga., has severe arthritis. His dozen or so business trips each year were excruciatingly painful. He had to take so much pain medication to squeeze his 6-foot-4 frame into an economy-class seat that it was damaging his liver. Last year, he got permission to fly "other than coach."
The Transportation Department also is hoping to make travel easier for federal workers who have disabilities: In early May, it planned to announce awards to SatoTravel and Omega World Travel for travel management services for federal travelers with disabilities.
"All [government] travel agencies say they arrange travel for these travelers, but we think it is B.S.," says Andrew Julian, who works in the chief financial officer's office at Transportation. Under the new contract, which any agency can use, "Specialized, highly trained people should help people with special needs get the services they need," says Julian. "They will be accountable for providing a higher level of services. We'll require these travel agencies to be expert on all the regs, and have special knowledge of the facilities our travelers need."
In theory, all travel agencies should know about access regulations and what the travel industry must do to comply with them. "But in reality, it is lip service," Julian says.
Changes in Attitudes
Most federal workers with disabilities agree that the physical and social barriers to traveling have eased. Yet problems and challenges remain. Those who travel rely on a positive and flexible attitude to get them through the rough spots.
Jeanine Worden, a Justice Department trial attorney, hits the road about two dozen times a year - and always with her guide dog, Molly. She runs into trouble when airline employees don't understand she needs - and is entitled to - a bulkhead seat so Molly has a place to sit. Like her co-worker Conway, Worden has trouble getting cabs to stop for her. "A lot of drivers refuse to take animals," she says. And she finds emergency exit information in hotel rooms often isn't in a format she can read.
Worden copes by carrying copies of "Questions and Answers About Service Animals" to hand out to travel industry workers. She gets to the airport early to negotiate for the seat she needs and, most important, she says, "I start out with the mindset that if I need to get there, I'm going to get there."
"I find myself doing a lot of education when I travel," says Worden. "And I try to do it in a low-key manner. It definitely is a challenge, but I remind myself, 'I'm going to see this as an educational opportunity.'"
While most federal travelers find their biggest challenges in the air or in hotels, the Energy Department's Daniel Cillo finds his closer to home. He works at the National Energy Technology Laboratory, which is headquartered in Pittsburgh and Morgantown, W.Va. Shuttle vans run lab workers back and forth along the 65-mile route three times a day.
But the vans are not equipped with wheelchair lifts, so they're of no use to Cillo. And none of the fleet cars has hand controls. So Cillo, a chemical engineer, makes the trip in his own car. When he's flown out of the area and needed a rental car, he's been able to get one with hand controls installed with a couple of days' notice.
Probably the biggest difference between wheelchair users and other travelers is that wheelchair users aren't fans of nonstop flights. Because the bathrooms on most aircraft are not accessible, long flights can be very uncomfortable. DOJ's Conway flies cross country, but she seeks out flights with long layovers midway, so she can use the airport bathroom.
So while attitudes and access have improved - "People don't get quite so freaked out when they see me coming," says Conway - there's still a ways to go. Sometimes Cillo can't get into a building without being hauled up a few steps. Most shuttles from airports to hotels are not accessible. Some airline staff "practically pat you on the head," says Conway. The list goes on. "If the general public had to put up with this stuff, there would be rioting in the streets."
But Conway and others develop coping strategies and an outlook that help them through the challenges. "Some things are going to be different because I have a disability," says Conway. "That's just the way it is. I don't expect it to be a piece of cake."
Know Your Rights
Architectural Barriers Act (1968)
Requires that buildings and facilities constructed or altered by the federal government or with federal funds be accessible to people with disabilities.
Rehabilitation Act (1973)
Prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in federal employment and in programs conducted by federal agencies, requires the government to provide reasonable accommodation and affirmative action for people with disabilities.
Air Carrier Access Act (1986)
Requires airlines to accommodate the needs of passengers with disabilities. Specifies passengers' rights and airlines' obligations. Among them: An airline may not require advance notice that a person with a disability is traveling and may not require that a person with a disability travel with an attendant (some of these rules do have exceptions). Also requires modifications to certain aircraft, such as movable armrests and accessible lavatories.
Americans With Disabilities Act (1990)
Entitles people with disabilities to the same rights and access to public facilities - including buses, trains, lodging and travel agencies - as nondisabled people.
Sources: Trouble-Free Travel, Nolo Press, 1998; People With Disabilities in the Federal Government: An Employment Guide, OPM, October, 1999; Justice Department
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