|
|
Open doors, open hearts
National campaign calls on congregations to meet worship needs of disabled
VICKI CABOT
Contributing Editor
Sometimes a missing chair is all that is needed.
Or a strip of glow-in-the-dark tape. Or a tightly woven carpet runner.
Then a wheelchair-bound congregant can sit next to family members during services. Or a visually impaired member can walk up the steps to the bimah. Or a physically impaired congregant can cross a slick or heavily carpeted surface with a walker.
Obvious solutions, yet they require a heartfelt commitment to opening doors to those with special needs.
"With a little creativity we can make our congregations more accessible," says Becca Hornstein, executive director of the community's Council for Jews With Special Needs.
CJSN, a tireless advocate for those with special needs for the past 13 years, is endorsing a national effort to promote accessibility in houses of worship. The Accessible Congregations Campaign, an interfaith project of the National Organization on Disability (N.O.D.) and Initiative 2000, a nationwide celebration of the achievements and contributions of people with disabilities, seeks to enlist 2,000 congregations by the year 2000 in its effort to remove barriers to the disabled. It asks for each congregation to first acknowledge that it has barriers to full participation of people with disabilities and to commit to begin to remove them. Barriers are not only architectural, say campaign organizers, but communicational and attitudinal as well. All can inhibit inclusion.
The campaign has been endorsed to date by 58 national and regional organizations. Leaders, besides CJSN, include the National Council of Churches, United Methodist Church and the Children's Defense Fund. The campaign is funded by a $25,000 grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation of Battle Creek, Mich.
Hornstein gives the Phoenix Jewish community high marks for its responsiveness to date. The many new and renovated area synagogues and temples reflect remarkable attention to assuring that buildings are structurally accessible. During the past 10 years, new facilities, including Temple Kol Ami, Congregation Bais Menachem/Chabad-Lubavitch and Temple Beth Israel, have sought to comply with stringent federal guidelines; and existing ones, including Temple Chai, Beth El Congregation, Temple Emanuel of Tempe, Temple Beth Sholom of Mesa, Har Zion Congregation, Temple Solel and Beth Joseph Congregation, have been remodeled to better accommodate the needs of their congregants.
"No one is turning their backs once (the needs) are brought to their attention," says Hornstein of local congregations. She notes that the N.O.D. campaign is just asking congregations to commit to try to provide accessibility. "Here," she says with pride, "we are doing it."
Renovations bring benefits
When Har Zion moved into its new home last fall, the congregation looked forward to finally having enough space to house its High Holiday services, which in previous years had been held at the Scottsdale Center for the Arts. An additional benefit was renovation of a choir loft in the building which formerly housed a church, to provide ample wheelchair seating.
"When we remodeled, we were very conscious of those issues," says Ann Pshaenich, executive director of Har Zion.
Temple Beth Israel, dedicated last year, also assured that its entire complex is accessible. Wide aisles, ramps to the bimah, spaces for wheelchair seating, handicapped-accessible restrooms and an elevator to the second floor of the education building were considered essential, says Terry Taubman, temple executive director.
Synagogues and temples, as religious institutions, are not required to comply with regulations delineated in the 1996 Americans with Disabilities Act unless their facilities are used for programs open to the general community.
Federal rules and regulations lay out parameters. These include precise specifications for parking, entryways, doorways, water fountains and restrooms.
Denise Thompson, director of the Arizona office for Americans with Disabilities, ticks off just a few. The ratio for handicapped parking spaces is two for every 25 spaces; doorways require a 5-foot-square flat area for access; ramps must not exceed a 6 percent rise (roughly one inch of height for every foot of incline;) and aisles must be at least 3 feet wide.
But structural compliance also requires heightened sensitivity to the needs and abilities of the disabled. Simple accommodations, such as mounting paper towel dispensers low enough for wheelchair accessibility, can be sabotaged if a trash can is placed in front of the dispenser, notes Thompson.
"There are lots of common-sense things that we often don't think about," Thompson says.
While the federal guidelines require that all construction since 1993 must comply with standards, existing structures are required to do whatever is "readily achievable" based on size and financial capability. Major structural renovation can be quite costly.
"There are certain things that over the years have come to be known as 'reasonable,' " says Thompson. "Depending on a situation, things that cost a couple of thousand dollars and under are considered 'readily achievable.' "
These might include purchasing assisted-listening devices for the hearing impaired or building an access ramp into the facility.
She counsels that accommodation for special needs is incremental. "Everything doesn't have to happen at once," notes Thompson. "In general we want people to know that this is a good-faith effort." She suggests that congregations adopt one project, such as building a ramp or providing Braille prayer books, as an initial fund-raising effort.
Other barriers remain
As obstacles to meaningful synagogue participation, the communication and attitude barriers are just as formidable as the more obvious structural barriers.
"We don't have a sense how many in our community don't hear," says Har Zion's Rabbi Mark Bisman. The problem is compounded by those who do not confront hearing loss, instead blaming their inability to hear on the speaker, says the rabbi. Educating congregants about hearing impairment and then providing for hearing assistance must be part of the Jewish community's mission, says Bisman.
The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America recently published an educational guide about the needs of the hearing and visually impaired, with suggested strategies to better meet them. These include providing interpreters for services or other communal events for the hearing impaired; designating seating for those who read lips; and providing large-print prayer books for the visually impaired.
"The majority of the deaf, blind and visually impaired Jews never attend synagogue," says Rabbi Eliezer Lederfeind, director of OU's outreach program.
A recently released 1998 Harris survey of Americans with disabilities, which showed that 54 percent of adults with disabilities go to church, synagogue or another place of worship at least once a month, compared to almost six out of 10, 57 percent, of those without disabilities. The gap has decreased since 1986, when it was 11 percentage points (55 percent among persons with disabilities, 66 percent among the non-disabled) to three percentage points today. However, pollsters say that the gap has narrowed because of a decline in participation among the non-disabled, rather than an increase in participation among the disabled population.
N.O.D. estimates that nationally there are 54 million men, women and children with physical, sensory or mental disabilities.
"You have to take the initiative to address the needs," says Rabbi Zalman Levertov of the Chabad-Lubavitch Center in Phoenix, which provides Braille prayer books and engages an individual to sign when needed. "It's important that anyone who wants to come, can."
However, accommodating those with special needs and making them feel welcome can be two different things. Minds and hearts have to open, as well as doors, note N.O.D. campaign organizers.
"Access just means that I can get there," says Hornstein. The larger issue is inclusion - making each person feel a valued member of the community. That is reflected in the N.O.D. campaign principles which stress the value of each person as an individual created in the image of God, with special gifts and talents to contribute to a congregation.
"I don't think that every member of the congregation thinks about those who are impaired," says Bisman. "It takes time to make people conscious."
Bisman says he uses the bimah to help increase awareness.
"We have to remind ourselves that the community is not only made up of those we see on a regular basis," he says.
"There are some who are not with us. We have to be sensitive and behave in a manner not to exclude them, even if we don't intend it," the rabbi adds. "I see that as part of our mission."
|
