Suit against Roanoke, Va. Valley View Mall settled

[mark handler]

Discrimination suit against Roanoke, Va. Valley View Mall settled

It was one of many disability-related suits against area businesses filed by a Florida lawyer.

By Laurence Hammack

981-3239

http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/301437

A lawsuit claiming that Valley View Mall discriminated against its disabled shoppers has been settled, the latest dismissal in a series of similar lawsuits.

Valley View was one of six Roanoke-area shopping centers sued in February by the National Alliance for Accessibility, a Florida-based group that advocates for the rights of people with disabilities.

The alliance also sued three stores in Christiansburg and Martinsville, two motels in Radford and Dublin, and Radford University.

All of the lawsuits alleged violations of the Americans With Disabilities Act, which governs access to public places by the disabled.

Of the 11 lawsuits filed by the alliance in U.S. District Court in Roanoke, only three are still pending.

The most recent settlement, involving Valley View Mall, was filed Monday.

William Furr, a Norfolk attorney who represented the mall, declined to comment on the terms of the settlement.

But in general, he said, most lawsuits of this nature involve technical violations of the ADA that can be corrected relatively easily to avoid litigation.

"I think if you visited any shopping center in America today, you could probably find something" that violates the act, Furr said.

The flurry of lawsuits in February came after Denise Payne, a Florida resident who has cerebral palsy, visited Southwest Virginia.

Payne, who attended the Southeast Unitarian Universalist Summer Institute at Radford University, also sued the school for what she said were problems she encountered while negotiating the campus in her wheelchair.

Her lawsuit against Radford was dismissed in April.

Among the barriers cited by Payne at Radford and in the businesses she visited: parking spaces for the disabled built on slopes, curb ramps with excessively steep grades, improper access to buildings, a lack of handrails, and restrooms that were unfriendly to people in wheelchairs.

The three lawsuits still pending are against Crossroads Mall in Roanoke, Spartan Square Shopping Center in Salem and the Comfort Inn in Dublin.

Since June, lawsuits have been settled against Tanglewood Mall in Roanoke County, Towne Square Shopping Center in Roanoke, Lake Drive Plaza in Vinton, J.C. Penney in Martinsville, Belk in Martinsville and Christiansburg, and the Best Western Inn in Radford.

According to court records, nearly 200 lawsuits have been filed across the country by Payne and two groups she is affiliated with, the National Alliance for Accessibility and Access for the Disabled.

Under the ADA, Payne cannot recover monetary damages. Her lawsuits filed in Roanoke's federal court asked that the deficiencies she cited be repaired.

The act does allow for her attorneys to recover their fees and litigation expenses.

The attorney who filed the lawsuits for Payne, John Fuller of Miami, has not returned repeated calls made to his office, in February and again on Monday.

 

[Frank]

I think just about every major shopping center in the country has been or will be sued over what are often technical violations that result from normal ground movement, wear and tear, and from changing regulations or disputes over interpretations of the regulations.

 

[mark handler]

I think just about every major shopping center in the country has been or will be sued over what are often technical violations that result from normal ground movement, wear and tear....

...slopes, curb ramps with excessively steep grades, improper access to buildings, a lack of handrails, and restrooms that were unfriendly to people in wheelchairs.... Not "normal ground movement or wear and tear".

 

[mark handler]

...and from changing regulations ...

The ADA has a clause that says if your project was built to comply with previous guidelines, you do not need to comply with the new guidelines.

 

[brudgers]

I think just about every major shopping center in the country has been or will be sued over what are often technical violations that result from normal ground movement, wear and tear, and from changing regulations or disputes over interpretations of the regulations.

If you ever worked with typical civil engineers, you would know that their CAD monkeys often don't know squat about ADA.

 

[Papio Bldg Dept]

If you ever worked with typical civil engineers, you would know that their CAD monkeys often don't know squat about ADA.

...or that the engineer's area of expertise is either fluid dynamics or copying another jurisdictions accessibility templates verbatim into their documents. Either way they still don't know squat about accessibility issues, and don't seem to care enough to change their drawings.

 

[Frank]

The ADA has a clause that says if your project was built to comply with previous guidelines, you do not need to comply with the new guidelines.

That is a defense against a suit the same as the cannot afford to make the changes argument, but does not prevent the suit in the first place.

 

[mark handler]

That is a defense against a suit the same as the cannot afford to make the changes argument, but does not prevent the suit in the first place.

Plain and simple, if your project complies, you will not be sued.

 

[brudgers]

That is a defense against a suit the same as the cannot afford to make the changes argument, but does not prevent the suit in the first place.

Any one can sue anyone. Film at Eleven.