Posted on 01/23/2009 4:00:08 AM PST by Virginia Ridgerunner
Marilynn Phillips is sick and tired of waiting for people to take her seriously.
The disability-rights activist has long said Gettysburg lags far behind many other towns when it comes to compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. For years, Phillips has filed complaints with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission.
But those cases take months, sometimes years, to resolve. In the meantime, Phillips said the businesses and other facilities she files against have largely ignored her concerns.
Now with the help of an attorney, Phillips has decided for the first time to file some Gettysburg cases in federal court in hopes of expediting the compliance process. Three local businesses are the defendants in the first series of federal cases, filed earlier this month in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania.
"After 30 years of all of this, it really is time to let someone take over and do the work as quickly as possible," Phillips said. "I can't wait another 10 years, 20 years, for people to stop laughing at this."
(snip)
Phillips called her latest allegations "slam-dunk matters" that she expects the court to find in her favor.
She also said she is considering transferring some of her pending PHRC cases to federal lawsuits.
(snip)
Phillips' lawsuits ask the court to order the defendants to bring their businesses into compliance and reimburse Phillips for attorney's fees and other litigation costs.
(snip)
"Since these businesses have essentially ignored the issue ... I thought, you know, time to get things done," Phillips said. "They've had much, much notice."
(Excerpt) Read more at eveningsun.com ...
Pathetic and disgusting.
She’s nuts. There are ramps and other accommodations for the disabled everywhere in Gburg.
If she will have her representation call the jury ignorant rednecks, she will need a wheelbarrow to carry all her money.
The Codori House of Gifts is as I recall one small step up. If she had a friend to tilt her back it would be easy to surmount. This one is looking for a fight, couple of very nice older Russian ladies run the shop, please patronize, it’s right on Lincoln Square.
Looks like she may be an attention whore.
Here’s an article form 1992 on her efforts and those like her.
http://www.empowermentzone.com/onepower.txt
If she had a friend.....
_____
Big if!
I think most people would hook her up to an 18 wheeler on RT.30 to make sure she left town.
The ADA is one of the biggest rip-offs that ever came down the pike. Millions of dollars are spent by businesses to meet requirements of a few people, many of whom wil never enter the business who has to spend this money.
I am not anti-handicapped persons, many of the ADA required additions are just fine , but there are some handicaped persons who use their handicap as an entitlement, and no I wouldnt want to trade places with them.
As a G-burg local resident, I can assure you that this woman has not tried to be constructive in her “activism,” but entirely destructive. Her entire history with the town is confrontational, and she is so angry and hateful, that no business can reason with her. And yes, most of the buildings she is complaining about are very old.
Phillips - who uses a wheelchair because of post-polio syndrome and severe osteoporosis - alleges she was discriminated against in August and September of last year when she attempted to enter Codori House of Gifts, 2 York St., Wentz Stained Glass Studio, 48 York St., and the Spirited Ladies Shoppe, 45 Chambersburg St. Each shop lacks an accessible wheelchair entrance, according to Phillips' lawsuits.
So she's going to run a bunch of small businesses out of work. Bravo, activist.
here is how the ADA suit scam works.
the activist is the “expert” for the testimony in the lawsuit.
A law firm as a lawyer who only does these cases (or just a solo that focuses).
They create a shell (straw man / fake) entity which is the plaintif.
Under the ADA a plaintiff MAY NOT recieve money damages. They can only get their LAWYER FEES, and EXPERT fees.
IOW that activist in the begining gets PAID for being a pain.
The ADA does not give warning, no notice to cure NOTHING.
Just the law using lawyers as bounty hunters funded by lawsuit targets.
ONE MILIMEETER off and costs and fees are awarded.
More from the link that you left out.
Phillips - who uses a wheelchair because of post-polio syndrome and severe osteoporosis - alleges she was discriminated against in August and September of last year when she attempted to enter Codori House of Gifts, 2 York St., Wentz Stained Glass Studio, 48 York St., and the Spirited Ladies Shoppe, 45 Chambersburg St. Each shop lacks an accessible wheelchair entrance, according to Phillips’ lawsuits. Representatives of those businesses could not immediately be reached for comment Thursday.
Phillips has been a disability-rights activist since 1987, when she filed her first complaint against Morgan State University in Baltimore for not providing a wheelchair-accessible restroom on the building floor where she worked. The complaint led to the restroom being renovated, along with a majority of the campus.
Since then, Phillips - a Hampstead, Md. resident - has filed numerous complaints throughout Maryland and Pennsylvania. Her first complaint in Gettysburg was filed in 2006 against the Majestic Theater, which is owned by Gettysburg College. Phillips alleged the theater lacked accessible emergency exits. College officials later addressed the issue.
The ADA prohibits discrimination against individuals on the basis of disability and requires public accommodations - such as businesses - to meet accessibility requirements. In some cases, that means providing a ramp for wheelchair accessibility.
There ARE limitations in the ADA.
How much money the company makes, employees etc.
The problem is these suits have become a billable hour mill for the lawyers and the “activists” who profit via sham expert fees.
The lawyers set up a charitable “entity” which serves as the plaintiff then the activist gets money as the expert witness circumventing the ADA rules.
There is no notice prequisit to filing suit. There also is no means of being “certified” in compliance. You could (and do) have new and accessable buildings which are still sued to generate the fees. Also after teh suit, there is no protection agains the NEXT “activist”.
Of course there are and I'm sure her attorney knows what the limitations are, or they wouldn't bother. They don't like to waste their time either.
The problem is these suits have become a billable hour mill for the lawyers and the “activists” who profit via sham expert fees.
If she doesn't have a legitimate case they will be thrown out. In the past it seems that she did indeed have legitimate cases.
You could (and do) have new and accessable buildings which are still sued to generate the fees. Also after teh suit, there is no protection agains the NEXT “activist”.
Is that what she is doing or does this have nothing to do with the article at hand?
ADA suits are a legal scam these days.
The legit cases are the EXCEPTION, the scammers are the rule.
It only takes a single out of compliance 1/2 INCH and this leads to attorneys fees and costs.
THe lawyers count on the fact that it is cheeper to pay the lawyers fees or this scam artists “expert fees”.
ADA suits are a cash cow, they have nothing to do with access as a rule.
I caught hell trying to go to classes at Ga Tech in the late 70's -- sat outside in the weather for at least two classes and looked through an open window. Then, after graduation, I worked for a HUGE corporation for three years in an office without an accessible restroom. I had to cross the street to the local neighborhood bar to use the restroom. Those that have never experienced lack of access/restrooms/travel will never understand.
I’m in Homestead Florida and we have one lady here who is infamous for using the ADA and her disabilities to get anything she wants and to act as she wants.
Her wheelchair has a sign on the back that say “I HAVE THE RIGHT OF WAY ALWAYS” and you better believe it. More than once she’s literally taken her motorized chair and driven into people, children included, who she claimed would not move out of her way on a sidewalk, store aisle or on a road.
Her electricity and water are provided through the City’s Utilities and each month when her bill arrives she goes to City Hall and demands to see the mayor or city manager. She claims she does not have to pay for any utilities because of her handicap protects her from any bills from a Gov. body. She’s been cut off many times and called the police wanting the person who cut her off arrested plus everyone working in the utilities department.
In the 4 years I worked for the PD I must have been called to a scene 4 dozen times, without exageration, where she was either demanding we arrest someone or she had rammed her wheelchair into someone (including a few children) or swung at them/hit them with a cane she always carries.
In one month, she called the station 127 times.
I’m in no way saying this is common with the handicapped but it’s easy for someone who’s filled with hate or just wants attention (in her case both) to us the ADA to their benefit and to harass others.
You can believe what ever you want. Court papers do not lie about this cases. Reporters lie all the time.
The fact is these scam artists go in with a minor issue and force the issue. She did not win the cases if the business was forced to settle as a business decision.
Businesses do not want to disclose their business income. It is cheeper to pay her 1000 expert fee and the X dollars to the lawyer to just go away.
It is amazing how many of these complaints settle with little or nothing changing in the business.
The ADA should change to prevent litigation mills. Legitimate issues should be noticed in advance. If a new building has been approved and given its completion papers then that should stand as presumption of compliance.
The joke of the ADA now has guild before innocence.
BTW FYI: it is easy enough to look up these womans court documents to confirm everything. Remember, reporters lie.
For businesses of Gettysburg, the place where the high tide of the Confederacy began to ebb, the place where arguably the civil rights movement began, and where the ideals of inclusion that were written about in the preamble to our constitution were reinforced by the emancipation proclamation, to be resistant to the ideals of inclusion and failing to uphold the Americans with Disabilities Act is disgraceful. They render themselves to the level of a cheap tourist trap, parasitically earning a buck off of the people that come to visit those hallowed battlefields.
Disabled people want the same access that any able bodied person wants, the same level of dignity. To date this woman has made no personal gain from this; no punitive damages have been awarded to her...she is simply asking for the right thing to be done, to be treated like a citizen, and an equal human being as the rest of us.
That a disabled veteran cannot enter these places infuriates me as a veteran. I would think that in a time of economic downturn, that a business would be willing to do what it takes to maximize the number of patrons that could enter and spend at its establishment. That a small business can accept low interest government loans and not be forced to comply with all laws like the ADA is certainly curious.
I would echo many of the comments posted; pathetic and disgusting...shame on the Gettysburg community.
Second, I live here in Gettysburg, and you do not have the full facts behind what this woman is doing. She does not even live in Adams County and does not patronize the businesses she targets. She lives in Maryland and makes it her personal hobby to terrorize all businesses within her immediate driving radius. All she and her husband do is go from business to business and berate onwers and managers who try to help them. Last fall she made a spectacle of herself by having her husband tape-measure every door of every business in the downtown area. Feelings were so intense that day, that she had to have a police deputy accompany her for protection while her husband did the dirty work, much to the deputy's chagrin.
Most of the buildings in Gettysburg are over a 100 years old, and it would be financially crippling for the property owners and renters to make the changes she is demanding, even though she is not a customer. No one has ever turned her away, and she has an unpleasant habit of personally attacking anyone who tries to assist her at their respective establishment.
The issue with this woman is not access, but power, and she is clearly abusing ADA to quench whatever personal demons are haunting her.
I invite you to read some of the comments at the posted link, several of which are from targeted business owners, so that you may be better informed about what is going on in this community with these ADA lawsuits.
You're not the woman described in the story are you, posing as a veteran? She's been known to troll the local news forums and use aliases to further her agenda.
Just curious...
Death is an underrated motivator
this is a classic ADA shakedown case.
Find a token “expert” some named plaintiff organization.
ONE MILLIMETER off on something and presto you get attorney fees, expert fees (the activist in this case) and move on to the next one.
ADA suits are now a scam for attorney fees.
An unfunded mandate that the feds outsourced to the ambulance class.
I am not the woman referenced, don’t even know her. I’m just an informed reader seeing ignorance and intolerance.
Only a person that is not disabled and cannot envision him or herself nor any of their loved ones being disabled would oppose ADA legislation. I’ve seen what bombs and bullets do to a person, and I imagined what my life would be like after a permanent disabling injury... there is the basis of my anger on this issue. Call it an overactive imagination if you like, or use it as a frame of reference for doing the right thing...
The current state of affairs in the US is that the ADA is one of the most unenforced pieces of legislation in the US because it so often falls into the “too hard to do” category. Taking down “whites only” signs was easy, desegregating schools was easy, allowing women to vote was easy...building a ramp or widening a doorway is too hard to do...even in 19 years.
The ADA is almost 19 years old... For a business anywhere in the US that was functioning to have not made changes to be compliant in the last 18 years means that: a) they are willfully breaking the law, or b) haven’t turned a profit in that time frame (highly unlikely). A business that has started up in the intervening years is negligent for not knowing the law and being compliant, and any agency that grants them a license to do business is likewise negligent from enforcing the law.
This isn’t about the Gettysburg Community or their ignorance. They are just facing one tenacious person that is willing to stand up for her rights in a way that is unsettling to them. This is a National problem that needs to be addressed, and more tenacious people like her are needed to change attitudes.
no argument about the original alleged intent.
However I have personally seen the scam in action from the law firm perspective. The setting up of the staw man plaintiff, the real party operating as a expert (essentially soliciting for cases), and the legal fee mill.
sorry but for every ONE legit ADA case there of hundreds of mere legal fee generating cases that are settle forgotten and NO CHANGES made after the fees are paid.
and finally do not assume too quick about anyone.
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