Posted on: Wednesday, February 13, 2002

Stadium agrees to smooth path for wheelchairs

By Curtis Lum
Advertiser Staff Writer

A settlement has been reached in a lawsuit filed by a disabled woman who accused the Aloha Stadium Authority of failing to maintain a wheelchair accessible path to the stadium.

Jennifer Cox filed the federal lawsuit under the Americans With Disabilities Act after she was injured as she was wheeled on a bumpy path to the stadium to attend a Janet Jackson concert Jan. 30, 1999. The suit was filed on behalf of Cox by attorney Stanley Levin.

Under terms of the settlement, the state agreed to make the stadium more accessible to wheelchairs and pay Cox $32,000, according to Deputy Attorney General Charles Fell.

Cox said on the day of the concert, the stadium did not provide a drop-off or pick-up area for disabled people. As a result, she said she had to "endure a 45-minute wheelchair ride over a very bumpy, pot-hole-filled and disorganized parking lot."

Levin said stadium employees were ignorant or "very insensitive" to his client's need to reach the stadium by wheelchair.

Cox, who has osteoporosis and suffered fractured ribs because of the rough ride, filed the lawsuit seeking monetary damages and improvements to the stadium.

Cox and the attorney general's office, which represented the Stadium Authority, reached an out-of-court settlement in December 2001. Terms of the agreement were released yesterday.

In addition to the payment, the state agreed to maintain an accessible, smooth pedestrian route from the sidewalk outside Aloha Stadium to its gates. Stadium officials agreed to modify physical barriers to increase accessibility to the disabled.

Stadium staff also will be required to attend training classes on the Americans With Disabilities Act.

Cox said the improvements should make the stadium "more friendly for disabled persons."

"It should mean that disabled persons should feel much more positive about seeing concerts or ballgames at the Aloha Stadium," she said.

Fell said the state acknowledged that changes were needed at the stadium.

"(The old path) wasn't designed and maintained with the idea in mind for people like her to be going over wheelchairs on it," Fell said. "Obviously we regret that the plaintiff sustained the injuries on that night and we recognize our obligations under the Americans with Disabilities Act."