Monday will be Memorial Day. For many Americans, Memorial Day is simply the front end of summer. On Monday, summer will begin.
There are many summer traditions but perhaps one of the most cherished is the swimming pool. Fortunately this is an election year so swimming pools have received a one-year reprieve from the Obama regime.
The problem comes from the Americans with Disabilities Act. The ADA was a good piece of legislation when it first came along in 1990. My late mother in law was confined to a wheel chair because of childhood polio. She worked for the Commonwealth of Virginia for years. However, the bathrooms in her building were so small that a wheelchair could not fit in. She would work for ten or twelve hours a day without a bathroom break.
Now, the Obama Regime is using the ADA to demand that all swimming pools add handicapped lifts so that people who are in wheelchairs will be allowed to get into pools.
The problem with these lifts is that they are very expensive. For some pools, the cost could be $100,000.
With the threat of pools closing for this summer, the Obama Regime backed off. The new rules would not be put into effect until after the election. What a stroke of luck. Obama has managed not to offend another group of Americans: swimmers.
One of the problems with the ADA is that owners who are out of compliance can be fined every day they are not in compliance. The risk for many pool owners is that some soup Nazi bureaucrat would come along and decide there is some hyper-technical violation of the law and impose a draconian fine on the business owner.
Many pool owners are faced with the choice and may well decide not to take the risk and simply close their pools.
In other words, swimming in pools could become nothing but a distant American memory, much like drive in movies, if the Obama Regime has its way.
The Obama Regime has promised that the rules apply only to new pools, not old ones and issues related to older pools would be considered on a case-by-case basis. They have said they would make sure that the law was enforced where the accommodations for a disabled person must be “readily achievable.” The Obama Regime is claiming that means these modifications to pools can be made easily and inexpensively.
Does anyone really believe them?
They are saying that now but what will they say if there is a second Obama term and he does not have to face the voters again?
The real problem here is a law that allows unelected bureaucrats to create rules and regulations that Congress never considered or even contemplated.
We have far too many laws with what is called “enabling legislation,” or a portion of the law that allows bureaucrats to write rules and regulations.
If Congress wants to do something for America, they can save our summers by taking this power away from the Department of Justice. If they want to save America, they can help do that by never passing another law that allows unelected bureaucrats the power to make rules and regulations.
G. Gordon Liddy wrote a book a few years ago called, “When I was a kid, this was a free country.” If we do not roll back the power of unelected bureaucrats, our children will be telling their children about the summertime marvel we used to have called swimming pools.
Tags: act, americas, department, disabilities, justice, obama, of, pools, swimming, with
Permalink Reply by Roland C. Cartier Jr on I can't wait to Vote this Chicago thug academiac professor out of office. Let him write some memoirs of his Last Days as President and gain some well needed perspective on real life "Joe The Plumbers" oops! That was a Freudian slip I was remembering Veep Joe Biden's remarks.
Permalink Reply by Melissa Ortiz on I'm so glad you posted this, Judson! I am appalled by this whole situation. Even as a woman who uses a wheelchair who is also a certified expert in the ADA, I still think the DOJ should be focusing on other things like securing the border between Mexico and the US. This is a waste of manpower and all sorts of other resources, especially tax payer dollars.
I like a good dip in the pool as much as the next person, but I'm not willing to spend DOJ manpower on enforcing my "right" to do so. Why isn't anyone asking why this is all of the sudden such a huge priority? What are they trying to hide from us by refocusing our attentions? Why isn't anyone talking about the permitting agencies who allowed these building projects to go forward and become operational with the proper equipment already in place? I could go on, but seriously...it's not worth my time. Sadly, other people will think it worth their time to file frivolous lawsuits about this very thing...taking away needed judicial resources from lawsuits and crimes that really matter.
Permalink Reply by Charles F Nichols on I would be better if our children were telling theirs about how we the people took back our freedom.
Permalink Reply by Melissa Ortiz on This is one way I can take back our freedom and not just talk about doing it.
Permalink Reply by Jeff Waller on No offense, but I'd put up a sign to read "No Wheelchairs in the POOL!"
Permalink Reply by Melissa Ortiz on Jeff, I know you don't mean to be offensive with that statement, but it isn't funny, either. You obviously don't get how the lifts work. Some people with disabilities can swim, they just can't walk into the pool. I am one of those who can get herself into the pool. The lift takes the PWD out of the chair and puts them into the pool so that a person doesn't have to carry them in and out.
Permalink Reply by roy rhea on Melissa, instead of schooling people on how this all should work, you and others like you need to publicly oppose this law. I am a nurse and I work with the handicapped every day. The people that I work with would not want to ruin everyone's summer just so they could have an expensive lift in a private pool. There are step down pool entries all over the place. Find one and use it. Condem this law and condem this president and his commie czars that have gotten out of hand.
Permalink Reply by Melissa Ortiz on Roy, with all due respect, please don't tell me what to do before you google me and see why I have the opinions I have. I oppose this idiocy publicly every day. It's what I do for a living, among other things, like educating people who don't understand the true intent of the ADA and how greedy lawyers and desperate pwd have corrupted it. I am the Founder and Principal of a nonprof (VERY NEW ORG, no website yet) called Able Americans. I'm uploading my statement as well as an article I wrote that I think you will like.
Permalink Reply by Robert H. Woodman on It's not the wheelchair going in the pool, it's the wheelchair user. Some people, like my hemiplegic wife, benefit from pool therapy, IF they can find a pool that has the appropriate access points.
And why is this administration worrying about wheelchairs when there are still buildings and stores that we encounter from time-to-time who meet the bare minimum requirement (or fail to meet it, but look like they have tried to meet it) for wheelchair accessibility. The place that really took the cake? We had to go to a doctor's office to have her disability evaluated for a disability retirement claim. The doctor was selected by the retirement board. The doctor's office had no wheelchair access.
Permalink Reply by Melissa Ortiz on Robert, EXACTLY. Been through all of this, too. Is there anything I can do to help you guys? Please feel free to email me at mkortiz317@gmail.com
Permalink Reply by Dennis Donner on Looks like the end progressives seek it destruction of the USA
A small amount of aspirin will ease a head ache
but a whole bottle is lethal
By the bell shaped curve/ law of large numbers
it seeps a disproportionate share of progressives are in government
We have tooo many progressives in govt
They have way more influence than they deserve
© 2013 Created by Judson Phillips.
