Great. To good morning and good afternoon, depending which time zone you are in. Welcome to the February I''m sorry, month early here, our January 28, 2003 ADA distance learning program. The title of today''s program is "Creating Access to Temporary Events." We would like to welcome all our participants across the country. We have a number of individuals who join us each month, representing and facilitating through all of the DBTAC''s or the Disability and Business Technical Assistance Centers nationally. This is the second session that we have had this month. We had a session last week focusing on employment and featuring the equal employment opportunity commission. This program is going to be 90 minutes in length, hopefully all of you are ready for that we will be operating it in a listen only mode. We will then be taking questions later on. So, keep up your questions and store them and be ready to ask when the time comes. Our speaker today joining us is Rex Pace. And Rex is the principal of Universal Design Solutions, located in Raleigh, North Carolina. Rex has a vast amount of experience in the area of universal design and accessibility. Prior to establishing his own company, he worked for four and a half years for the center for universal design, located at North Carolina University. In his position there he was the coordinator of technical assistance and he was the lead designer in many of their demonstration projects. Prior to his work with the center for universal design, he was with barrier free environments for eight years and many of you may be familiar with barrier free environments as a company originally founded by Ron Mace and someone who is a leader in the universal design field. Rex is also the co author of the guide known as "Accessible Temporary Events: A Planning Guide," which was a document that was recently released, just in the past several months and was conceptualized originally several years ago by members of the staff of barrier free environments and was part of a need that had been identified by many of the disability and business technical assistance centers to have some information available to individuals regarding temporary events. Many people had fairly good understanding or at least gaining good understanding of what a permanently built environment might look at, but we know for a fact that many of us throughout our months and years, participate in temporary events and temporary events can cover the whole host and gamut of a fair or a bake sale or a craft show or an antiques show or a music event or some other type of cultural event. Polling places are technically a temporary event for the time period that someone might be voting. So, there is just many, many events that are part of our temporary environment, being that they aren''t necessarily part of a permanent built environment but are created specifically, case by case, for an event may use permanent spaces but the event itself is not something that would be ongoing so this guide came out of those discussions and a need to help develop some technical assistance materials and such and Rex will give you some more background and idea about that program. Just want to let people know that if you are interested or need accessibility to real time text on the internet, you can follow along by linking through our website at www.adagreatlakes.org. By linking through that system, you can connect with the real time text on the internet and follow along with the session. In addition, you would be able to create your own transcript of the session and save it for your own future review. We do also create an edited transcript and post it to our website, along with a digital recording of this session, which is, again, posted to the website, so that you would be able to access that at a later time. Archive of all of the sessions that have been offer through this collaborative effort with the centers can be accessed on our website, again, at www.adagreatlakes.org. At this time, I would like to turn over the session to Rex pace and let him begin. Just a word of note that the images that Rex will be referring to during the session are available online off of our website and you can link to them. I do let you know that they are fairly large images, so if you are using an online access, be patient with those. A text version of the slides is also available online, as well as the resources that Rex will be referring to. So, Rex, I will turn it over to you.
Okay, well, I just want to say thanks for having me here today and it is kind of a presentation is a neat one for me. I think one of the really key advantages to these auto presentations is you don''t actually have to look at me. Unfortunately, you are still forced to listen to me but we will have pictures that will help with that later on. Again, I would like to express my appreciation to the Great Lakes DBTAC and everyone''s participation today. Of course, the main focus of today''s presentation is making a temporary convenient successful and we will use the manual, which most of you probably have at your site, a manual called "Accessible Temporary Events: A Planning Guide," to give structure to today''s presentation. The manual is the most important thing in today''s offering, because it is something you can use and refer to long after you are through with my presentation. So we will take a minute and we will go over some more on the manual in a minute. So, what are temporary events and what do we mean by that? I think Robin summed it had up pretty well. It can mean a very wide range of things from street festivals, craft fairs, music events, county fairs, air shows, cat and dog shows, sports tournaments, a whole array of things. And the way I think of them is that they are events that take place either in single way or intermittent way, may happen once a year or once every quarter year or maybe once and that is it. Cover a real wide range here. They can take place in spaces meant for them or maybe were meant for them, like an auditorium, used to having temporary events or something all the way to something like a street festival, that takes place in the street. We will talk about that more in a minute. The need for the manual and general good information on the subject is apparent to us, but just because we are dealing with temporary or intermediate situation doesn''t change the basics of what we are after, which is access. So it is really basically all the same old stuff, except in a different context and I think you will see the trend emerge as you deal with the issues. The manual, in addition to helping those who want to promote access is also intended to be a working guide for people who are unfamiliar with the topic. We are careful about the way we wrote it and the language we use. This would include a range of professions and interest and obviously this would include event planners and organizers, it may also include facility managers and architects, people who have to actually deal with the physical design of the space. This would be a useful book for them. Of course this is a useful manual for state and government, local agencies, partner and facilitate such as that. So the book is also a good show and tell tool. It is helpful to be able to show the images in the book, maybe less aware of the issues and they will get the concepts quicker for a lot of people, they will get the concepts quicker if they can see a drawing or see something happening in a picture. Let me give some credit for the publication, because it is a center for universal design publication done in conjunction with the southeast disability business and technical assistance center or DBTAC. The authors were Leslie Young and myself, we were the primary authors. Ron Mace and Karen Olander were contributing authors. I would like to extend many thanks to the reviewers at DOJ, instrumental for us getting interpretation and in general, the support of NIDRR, National Institute for Disability and Rehabilitation Research for being supportive of these kinds of project and also like to extend appreciation to the Great Lakes DBTAC, the Rocky Mountain DBTAC and their directors for additional support of this project. Finally, with many hearty thanks to the southeast DBTAC and in particular, director Shelley Kaplan for their critical support and assistance in the project. The project would not have happened without them. A little bit about the organization and use of the manual, it has six chapters. Basically the first half is kind of geared toward planning issues. The second half is more technical, actual design solutions to particular problems. It can be used at different levels. An event planner may find the first couple of chapters more useful and then the facility''s manager might have more on the last four chapters because it deals more with architectural barriers. So, now let us look at some key parts of the ADA standards for accessible design and start there. There are a few things you want to be aware of in regards to this topic. For those of you who happen to have it handy, if you look on page five of the ADAAG or have the gray and white handbook that has code of federal regulation written on the cover, that is page 496. We will see this is the scud section of the ADAAG and we see in section 4.1, minimum requirements. We have the section 4.1.1 application. And then the fourth paragraph, the 4 next to the paragraph, you see something about temporary structures. I will just read from that temporary structures. These guidelines cover temporary buildings or facilities as well as permanent facilities. Temporary buildings and facilities are not are not permanent construction but extensively used or essential for public use for a period of time. Examples of temporary buildings or facilities covered by these guidelines include but are not limited to reviewing stands, temporary classrooms, bleacher areas, exhibit areas, temporary banking facilities, temporary health screening services or temporary safe pedestrian passageways around a construction site. Structures, sites and equipment directly associated with the actual process of construction, such as bridging, materials, waste or construction trailers are not included. So, that gives us something some important information. So we can see how important this is to understanding. In fact this paragraph was one of the main interpretive motivations for our book. Other than that there is not a lot else about temporary structures or anything else that specifically addresses temporary events in the guidelines. On the opposing page, there are there is something specifically mentioned about a portable toilet requirements and if you go look on the page, off the one we were just reading from, kind of buried north of the right hand column, I will just read it in paragraph six. For single user portable toilet or bathing units clustered in a single location. That was portable. The question, single location, at least 5% but no less than one toilet unit or bathing unit complying with 4.22 or 4.23 shall be installed installed at each cluster, whenever inaccessible units are provide. It goes on to given a exception for portable toilets at construction sites, which are just used by employees of a construction company. That is pretty much it. That is as extensively detailed as the standards get about what to do with temporary structures, which, of course, are a critical component of a temporary event.
Rex, if I could just let people know if they don''t have ready access to the architectural standards and such that they are something that is available online. You can access them through the U.S. Access Board, the federal agency responsible for developing those guidelines. That can be done on their website at www.access-board.gov. And you can link directly to those. In addition, if you are looking for a hard copy, could you contact one of the your regional disability and business technical assistance center at their 800 number, 800 949 4232. And request a copy of the standards themselves.
I do point out that, in particular, first paragraph that I quoted, it is just as important. Its a good one to have, even if you have to point it out to somebody, in addition to the temporary structures, there are also a lot of important communication and program, using the word generically here, program issues of great importance, temporary events, we will touch on these in a minute. So in terms of a physical space, we are talking about a situation that could be a combination of both permanent and temporary facilities, with the permanent aspects being used some times for what they were intended for and sometimes in a different way than they were originally designed for, just to give the example of a street fair again. The street, obviously not intended to be an exhibit space but changed to be an exhibit space for a temporary period of time. It may be used in conjunction with a permanent facility such as there may be a school adjacent to it, in which they are using the auditorium for part of the overall day''s festivities and, of course, the auditorium in that school is designed to be what it is, in essence, a permanent facility. So it can be a back and forth dynamic to these kind of events that you really have to consider. Like I was saying, the other really big issue is communications access. You know, can everyone get information about the events? Once they get there can they interact with staff or vendors or performers or exhibiters? In the book we go into a lot of detail about these scenarios and situation a lot of these issues depend along the procedure and policy side. For instance is your publicity info in alternate formats and so forth, how ease very they to request and so forth? Of course, they are the same Title II and Title III issues before these temporary events. As with all other areas of concern in the ADA. In fact, temporary event situations, we can have a we can have a sometimes, its typical in a city or state events to have corporate sponsors or significant exhibiters who are, in fact, public accommodations. The only easy answer I can give to such situations is to make them as accessible as you can. Ultimately, a lot of these are very situational and fall along the lines of a letter of the ADA where there is overlapping coverage between different titles of the law. One interesting note, events which are planned only for employees, say something such as the office picnic day or something like that, it is essentially really a Title I issue and is an employment issue. In this case, we are talking about modifications to accommodate a specific employee and not a broad application of the standards for accessible design. However, this is really a side issue to what we are mainly discussing today. But let us spend some time talking about planning issues prior to the event, whatever they may be. Because much of the success related to access is going to be termed in this phase. The battle is a lot of times won or lost in the planning phase. And the main thing I would really encourage organizations to do is to have someone that claims ownership of the accessibility issues in the planning process and will see it through the whole event itself. Let me emphasize that every event should have an accessibility coordinator, someone who will see that process through. Somebody who you can go to, who will take care of, who will answer, it will make the time to deal with the issues. I think that is critical. Another critical point is the involvement of people with disabilities in the planning stage and all those who are knowledgeable about the critical issues. For a lot of these event planners this is going to be a learning process the first few times around and maybe even longer. There are certain mechanisms that can work pretty well, like advisory committees or even general efforts can be very helpful. Lots of disability groups can offer a lot of support to people planning and even accessibility consultants, I think, are justified, particularly in the in the instant of large events. It gets back down to what I call the local level and people in the communities knowing about each other and knowing about talking to each other and knowing about working together. Of course, the one of the best ways to handle access is to find a site that is successful to begin with when you want to have an event. And so but this can vary depending on your circumstances. Generally, I encourage people to remember a sequence for how to look for a site, which is, you know, first the best thing, get an accessible site. If you can''t do that try to get as many permanent modifications done to the site before an event. And if you are really stuck, then and can''t do another site, can''t get some of the chances, be prepared to make some temporary chances to make it work during the course of the event. Of course in relation to all of this you need to get a credible assessment of a proposed site, so you can know what you are getting into. On a final note, I just wanted to say that connect the publicity materials themselves, make them accessible if possible, or at least easier to read. Handouts and fliers with clear and large print, big contrast between large and background. Try, if you can to broadcast in different types of media to reach some populations, which may not be reached by another media. For instance there may be people who wouldn''t be able to read, for one reason or another, they would hear about things on radio or TV. Even something like local cable can be an outlet for this. And of course, TTY is going to be a sponsoring organization too. So that is just kind of a very brief overview of the main issues and right now, I think we will go to we will go into our slide show. We will go through the images that you have on the web or either in your handouts, one by one and just get a sampling and of some of the significant issues that are involved. Be sure to refer to the manual for dimensions and details, so forth. A lot of the images we pulled out of the book are simplified, they don''t have the dimensions on it. So, we will pull up our slide number 1, and this is really just a photo of a typical scene. In this instance, it was an open house at a university in the city, the city being Chapel Hill. I guess you can probably guess which university this is. Also participating in an open house. We can already see how we can have different organizations involved and so there is a logistics issue here getting all the different people to understand that access is an important issue and something they need to think about. On slide 2, am I giving enough time for the images?
Sure, go ahead.
To load? Okay. The next few images are actually from a large pullout in the book and kind of give a sampling in a different situation, scenarios where temporary events can happen and what they can be like. And slide 2, we see kind of an event in an urban environment a lot of times in these situations, like we have a downtown area, with some high rise buildings and a street corner and then the auditorium off to one side of the plaza. In the plaza, we have a crowd that is gathering for a political speech. We can see that we have a stage and there is, of course, access onto the stage. A lot of times in these situations there is good accessibility because it is a very man made environment, hopefully the city is current and they have decent curb ramps and so forth. The issue may be more of things that you bring into the situation. For instance, a lot of times, you know, people will TV crews come and string cables everywhere and you want to be conscious of are these becoming an obstacle. Are they aware people have to get through certain areas, people supply trucks blocking necessary accessible routes or ramps that are important? Those kind of things. Also, we see in the auditorium bill next to the plaza, here again is an example of space designed to show temporary events and has exhibit. Still again, you have to be conscious once you get the exhibits into the space, are there things going on in the space that you need to make sure are accessible. And slide 2
We would be on slide 3 now.
That is right. I''m sorry. Slide 3. Good. Remind me of that. And we see in our upper left hand corner the example of the street fair we were talking about earlier, where the road has been blocked off and people are setting up exhibits and it is very clearly an example of a space not intended for that and using it for something completely different from what it was intended to be to begin with. It was intended for cars to turn down and now it is an exhibit space. We want to think about how people are getting around barriers to block the street off, are there spaces they can get through that are accessible enough and so forth? We also can see how this can be used in relation with a site that was intended to gather, right next to the street is an outdoor amphitheater, where people come and sit on the grass and listen to music and so forth. And we see that the overall space was intended for this kind of activity, but we are bringing in temporary elements like structures and cars and stuff, that people are going to have to interact with. Moving a little off to the center of the page, we see the classic port a john issue, port a toilet issue, usually an issue in these kind of situations. Throughout the whole page, we are seeing, we have a lake with some exhibit on it. I would like to point out, one of the things about this project, not often you get to go to a Viking ship when it comes to accessibility, but you get the point you can have some pretty odd things come up in some of these events there is some thought how you deal with that and so forth. Of course, down in the lower hand corner of the page, we see some airplanes. Often we have the issue of large objects and how they are accessed. Talk more about those in a little bit. On slide 4, we can see we have more rural instances, of temporary events happening. These can be more challenging in terms of accessible routes, defining accessible routes, level changes, start dealing with the natural environment. Have to be careful on a lot of things. I think on the left hand page, on the left hand side of the page, we see some cars parked on the grass. It is very common, these temporary parking situations, common issue to deal with. So, I think we can see the range in these three previous slides. Let us move on to slide five. And that is the typical temporary structure. Temporary structure, the tent, this is just to re-enforce, you still need to conform to the standards and work, just because they are temporary structures doesn''t mean they are exempt from having to be accessible. Go to page, I mean, slide 6. And again, just wanted to re enforce that you will want to keep lots of service issues in mind and accommodation issues in mind. For instance, a lot of the exhibit will have moving exhibit themselves and they are not conducive to being accessible because of some technical reason, they have to be on wheels and a chassis and it is really good for there to be for exhibiters at an event to understand there is perhaps a policy at the event they have to accommodate, be willing to accommodate and know how to do it appropriately. Slide 7, which included the image of the TTY, re enforce the issue of communications access. This is something that comes up repeatedly in temporary events. And people need to be conscious of that. Visit slide 8, in this image, we have we are kind of up in the air looking down on a parking lot and a road and the entrance to a building that could be like a convention center, kind of like a convention center, display center. This issue, we are addressing here issues of how to get to the site. That is the first thing you are going to have on your mind, once you figure out the planning and everything, how am I going to keep people here you see this gray path, which is an accessible route and leading from the bus stop and from the subway, elevator coming from the subway in the upper right hand corner. We see it traveling alone. And in this particular instance, we are trying different strategies. We are going to take advantage of what we have that does work there are curb ramps that are accessible, we are going to use those. Then where we don''t have curb ramps, we are going to block off a portion of the street and put in temporary ramps to get people into our site. So we are using a combination of using what is existing that is accessible, adding what is not there, at least for the life of the event and also, if we are creating something that really didn''t have before, to the left side of the page, we see a van pulling up to a drop off zone. In this case, not something that would normally be part of this facility and we are kind of setting up for this event, whenever people are moving through it and so forth, we are we interview something new, make sure that is successful and complies with the standards as much as possible. Go to slide 9. And of course, in parking one of the fundamental issues is key and just want to re enforce the fact to let people be aware that we do have the van parking as well as the what is conventionally thought of as accessible parking, five foot access aisle. We are going to have to deal with the eight foot access with the vans. It doesn''t go away just because of a temporary situation. Go to slide 10. Here is an example we pulled from the book, where we were, for one reason or another, have to go a completely temporary solution. This is a strategy people have used, where they essentially blocked off a parking space and then put in a portable ramp. Do take care to put in portable ramps that can be securely fashioned. I''m kind of paranoid. I like to see them nailed or screwed in at some point, at least for the life of the event. A lot of times, they are designed to have grippers on the bottom and somewhere designed to have ribs that fit over the curb and so forth. That helps stability. But you really want to be careful about that also notice that we have put in some temporary signs for the parking spaces. Along with this, we also want to particularly when you have large areas, thousands of people coming in and parking, like a state fair. We want to give good signage for people to drive to park that is accessible. Go to slide 11. Here is just some examples of the temporary accessibility signs. You can actually buy these. You can make them, but you can also buy them. You would be surprised at the selection of signs and what they say now you have. You can get them in a lot of the facilities, a lot of facility managers get supply books and all, will have these kinds of things in them. Go to slide 12. Again, once we, you know, get to the event, then we get around the event, we are still dealing with basically the same issues, one of the key ones, accessible route, can we get to the path ways, can we get through the doors? Do we have head clearance? Can we get up to the exhibit. We see here, root coming from the outside of the building into the interior. In this instance there is a ship on display, somebody pulling up to it to look at it. We are still dealing with all the same issues. Slide 13. One strategy people have done is to provide temporary ramps, which you can now get a pretty good selection of, as opposed to in the past. You can get them so that they do meet up with the standards, left handrail extension and transition between the surface and the ground, the lip is not complying and not a hazard. Curb protection. Some of these ramps are rather ingenious, they actually have hinges on the top and bottom flaps so that it levels out the handrails and so forth. And the main challenge of using these is fine when you can rent it really depends on where you are at, how easy these are to rent as opposed to buy. Let us go to slide 14. This is again this is a portable lift in the place and this is something that may also be an option. Just be careful that it is installed correctly and it doesn''t pose a hazard. Again, you would be working with your local resources to find people who would rent these. Go to slide 15.
Rex, is there a time when you would recommend that a lift versus a ramp in these situations? I mean, when you are dealing with certain distances or anything of that nature?
Yeah, I think basically become an issue of practicality at some point. Once you get up over it, think about 1 to 12 being the maximum slope, once start getting 30 inches, which is about three steps or so probably three to four steps, you start getting into a level change where you are talking a pretty long ramp. And may just be impractical to get a long ramp in this situation, particularly if it is an interior space. There you may opt for the lift, not that I like a lift better than a ramp. Actually, I prefer the non-mechanical solution, but just an issue of necessity. The main issue is going to be the distance you have got to get vertically. After a certain point, you just aren''t going to have the space for a ramp.
Are you aware whether or not these particular portable lifts require any different kind of power source that would have to be a consideration?
That can be an issue. In public buildings, they have some kind of some way to get that power adequately run off, like a school setting, you know there is probably something you can do. There being outlets that will power it or having run the cable cords and the extension cords to get to the source, might have a little bit more difficulty in a residential setting or rural setting. That make sense?
Yes. Just wanted the right clarification on that.
And I don''t know all the specifics about it, it really depends upon what is available around. And in that instance, you can sometimes companies that cater to these kind of events to begin with set up vendors with booths and whatnot, sometimes they will have options for renting accessible platform lifts and sometimes be can even be like a little medical supplier in a larger city or somebody who does work with even like somebody who does work with van modifications, they may have a resource for this. It is a very situational thing. You have to work with what is available in your area. Does that make any sense?
Yes.
In slide 15 this is a focusing event in on exhibit area. You can see we have same issues, accessible route, being able to get into the exhibit booths and see what is on display and we also have here have a scenario of a additional model of a house, which we see somebody with a visual impairment touching. We really encourage people to provide tactile exhibits, some kind of exhibits that give somebody who maybe has low vision or has some kind of vision disability a chance to participate in finding out what is going on. Just because somebody can''t see doesn''t mean they can get a lot of information out of the experience. Also, while I am on this I would like to note, one of the things we do not have in our resource guide, the Smithsonian booklet called "Smithsonian guidelines for accessible exhibit design." If you are interested in that, you might want to contact them for a copy of it. It has a lot of information that is geared more toward the exhibit side of things. They intend it for museum situations, but you can see where a lot of the applicable and temporary situations. Slide 16, we see a common problem with these temporary structures, these tent and so forth. They can be protruding object hazards. People have to be careful to pick designs that aren''t going to be dangerous. Then on slide 17, we see another type of displaced exhibit you see often and in this instance it is basically like an object protruding off the wall. We wouldn''t want that to be a hazard either. We want to make sure it is detectible by somebody using a detection cane. Slide 18. Another issue is accessible counter height. Here again it can be difficult sometimes, when you are dealing with vendors who have come in with a truck or pulling how would you describe, have a chassis or something holding up the serving space up off the ground. So I think it is particularly important for something like you can accommodate somebody to a certain point, but for like self serve counters and so forth, they need to be lowered, people can get at them, position themselves, take the time they need. Go to slide 19. Wouldn''t it be neat if we had interactive exhibit and so forth at these kind of situations that were actually accessible. You could use them. As far as compliance, there may be instances, where a side approach would be appropriate. I did like the image of this. Go to slide 20. This is a game, we run into the games and so forth in these environments. In is a game, guns set up with a bull''s eye and taken one of the guns and lowered it and provided a knee space for it. You can say pretty safely when it comes to these games you have to have an accessible route to them and some maneuvering space, but you do have the issue of what is the fundamental nature of the game? You are not really obliged to change that to meet ADA compliance. So, there is some gray area there, how to interpret it and how far to go. I would like to encourage people to go as far as we have shown it here. I think the best reference we have in a more specific way for this topic is the final rule that the access board just put out on what is recreation make sure you have I have this, final rule on recreation and they have a section on amusement rides that I think would be worth looking at, recreational facilities and have some interesting areas. The best we have got until DOJ accepts it.
Again that is available on the U.S. Access Board''s website as well.
Yes. And if you are dealing with these temporary events a lot, that final rule is worth reading. Robin, you can probably better describe it at the end of this. Slide 21 is just an image of a plane on display and it brings up a unique problem in a lot of these types of events, how you deal with access to something like this. Slide 22, we see one way of approaching that, which is to provide a comparable experience. Maybe its not practical or appropriate to the object on display that have access into it. When I say programming, it may destroy the some important content about the object. You could have video tours of the experience of being in it or models and so forth that is one way to provide a comparable experience. Slide 23, if you have a lot of this kind of thing going on, you might want to have a mock up representation. At that point, you may say, well this is such a significant part of our event, we really do need to give more of a truer experience, maybe part of it, be a mockup of the large object or even the replica of the large object cut up and put up in accessible fashion. Of course slide 23 let us go to slide 24. Of course, nothing is better than having absolute access into the object that is what we really want. I think a lot of whether we can do this or not depends on the situation what kind of event it is, what is the resource of the entities having the event so its a gray area here, but these are strategies at different levels. Nothing is better than having actual access into it. If we can''t have that, we can do a mockup. If we can''t do that do a video tour people can watch in accessible locations. There are different ways we can approach this. Page 25 I''m sorry, slide 25, we have a another issue in addition to going and looking at things, often have scenarios, people are participating in activities, make sure those are accessible too. We go to slide 26. Here we have an instance of, you know, a table that somebody could pull up to and participate in activities with other people. This can be something as simple as some objects on a table for people to look at, maybe pottery or something, a closer chance to look at something else on display, could be something more like a class, people are participating. You should note you will also have communications issues that you will be concerned about. On slide 27, just want to show this image to re enforce that. In addition to the public, we can have performance with disability and we need to consider that too and account for that. On page 28, here again is just another image of a stage and we can see one of the things we encourage people to do, when they set up a stage, have a little additional space for an interpreter and a good background so people can see the interpreter and so forth. Here we see a ramp that is pretty well constructed too. Lets go to page 29 I mean slide 29. And here we have the portable toilet style issue and we all know why this is important. And this just shows you how we can have a real size difference in the conventional stall and larger accessible stall. Another thing, encourage people to put these in a place people can get to them. Utilize your parking lot, utilize your walks to get up to these necessary provisions. On slide 30 on slide 30, again, just re enforcing that we want the facility owners to make as many changes ahead of time. Really, at this point, most people should have done their in terms of public accommodations, should have done their readily achievable barrier. You should be at a higher level at this point. The simpler stuff should have been done by now. It doesn''t mean it has. There is some pressure you can put on the sponsors, saying these facilities should be up and higher level compliance now, they ought to be. In this instance, just taking out a toilet and combining two stalls to make one larger toilet stall. In slide 31, we have an example of again, just to go over some of the smaller things probably should have been taken care of by now but haven''t, here we see the bathroom that has a lot of problems, doesn''t have adequate knee space, the mirror is too high, soap dispensers are up over obstructions, could be hard to research, considered hard to reach, trash can in the way. If we go to slide 32, we can see we can still accomplish a lot with fairly simple modifications, working on the apron of the counter, providing bar, soap and towels out on the counter, installing additional dispenser and full length mirror. These are things that we can do to make a situation better, even if we don''t have we can still we can always improve the accessibility. Page I mean slide 33, we see an instance where we are not really modifying the bathroom but putting up a screen, given the number of people using the space may be appropriate. We have a vestibule into the bathroom that is too small. Just leave the doors open and put a different kind of screen on the entrance to the toilet room. And then on page 34 here we have a tent, to provide shade and some water. I think these are important features to have at outdoor events, maybe not necessarily required to have it, but we encourage people to have places for people to get out from the sun and get water, particularly important to a lot of people, use building devices, important to a lot of older people. So, there are some things we do encourage in the book, not necessarily required but we think are good ideas, like this and accessible courtesy phones and so forth. So I just want to say a few more things before I wrap up here. Again, when it comes to resources, I encourage people to build strong ties with their local disability organizations and groups. Rentals of lifts and ramps are a possibility but they are not always easy, particularly in the rural and isolated areas. In addition, the resource sheet that you have got today, I would like to point out two books that were very good and very inspirational to us in our own publication. One of those books was "The planner''s guide to barrier free meetings" by barrier free environments that is a really good book and another book called "A guide to planning accessible meetings" by June Kales and Daryl Jones, which is a really good book. These are two good references to have, in addition to this book for using who deal with this topic on an ongoing basis. Probably go on longer if you really want me to perhaps we should do questions and answers next.
Go ahead, Marcia, or someone from your site.
Hi this is Linda Henry, I''m at the site with Marcia. And I missed the titles of the two reference books that were just mentioned about
They are in the handout, the resource handout in the
And that resource handout, you should have received. If you have not it is on the website. But you can go ahead, Rex and give the name of those again.
Two of the books I think are good are the "The planner''s guide to barrier free meetings," which was done by barrier free environments. And the other one was "A guide to planning accessible meetings" by June Isaac Kales and Daryl Jones.
Okay. Thank you.
Both of those are still available in print. So
Go ahead, Rick, or someone from your site.
[ inaudible ]
I am just going to repeat that it was difficult to hear because of some of the background noise when you are using a speaker phone. But as I understand your question, you described that you have an open event out in a field, that would be field event, where horses and dogs and such would be involved in chasing birds and things of that nature, basically a wide open outdoor event in an open rural field and what type of accessibility considerations would be necessary. I did characterize that correctly?
Yes, you did.
Okay, go ahead then, Rex.
I think we have to get back to one of the fundamental in terms of ADA compliance, Americans with Disability Act compliance, we get back to one of the fundamental kind of concepts in it, you are not fundamentally altering the nature of activity. In terms of getting on horses and if I''m understanding this correctly and pursuing birds and dogs and so forth, I don''t know there is a lot you would do in terms of changing that activity. Your issues may have to deal with more of say where the activity may start from a site it may start from a clubhouse or some kind of outdoor facility or something. Is that a correct assumption?
We start out in the middle of an open field.
you would come up into like a parking lot or something?
No.
wouldn''t even do that?
Nope. It is just come off of the road into the middle of a field.
Oh, well that is tough. That is tough. I would think that is a good question. I would think at some point there is a place where people are gathering and they are getting an orientation. And they are starting from a point and would say from the point you got out of your car to you have the orientation, you could make a case that there should be an accessible route to that point and then from that point, once you start to do the activity itself, perhaps not. Does that seem reasonable?
Yes. Complications, because there is no roads or anything once come into that middle area and sometimes we go back, you know, within a quarter of a mile to a half mile within the area before we stop and start going.
Yeah.
The issue is obviously going to be your spectators and, you know, if there are spectators and any rest room or other facilities, creating a accessible path of travel to the maximum extension feasible. You have to look at what has been improved in the area, addressing has that been improved such that it is stable, firm, slip resistant service and meeting those types of standards, still recognizing it is an outdoor natural environment and you are not required to pave the world.
Right. Right. But you are separating, these are the activities intended for the event and then there is the old stuff like the rest rooms and the parking and maybe there are requirements there.
Ask one other question while I have got you?
Yes.
Go ahead. You are going to have to pick up your hand set or something, we are really unable to hear you or that site or we will have to drop it.
This is Karen with Indiana protection and advocacy. My question is when you have a temporary event that is held at a permanent site, such as like a fair, the state fair, and you have vendors that are coming in to do, say a home show or even the even the state fair and certain buildings are not accessible but there is displays at that building, who is overall responsibility is it both the vendors coming in and the state basically for the state fair? A good example is actually personal example, my son this summer went with me to the state fair, took a look at a display that was my niece''s entrance into the 4 H fair. And the item was on the third floor of a building that was totally inaccessible to my son. We made the trip out there and my son was in tears because he couldn''t even go see his cousin''s display on the third floor. Okay, so it is a temporary event at a permanent building. Whose responsible is it for accommodations?
That can be a shared responsibility. I think in this instance, it sounds like would you have to know something about how the event was set up. If they are telling the vendors you are going to be here and you are going to be here and they are not, you know, not a joint decision, I think it is more the state issue. And really think at this point, doesn''t sound like, the way I interpret it, should be having situations like that happen, a permanent facility owned by the state, there should have been some recourse to make it access anybody some way, even to a programmatic change. I think the issue with the vendor or exhibiter has to do more with what they are showing. For instance if one were to bring on a, do a space, exhibit, space to go into and experience something, their obligation has to do more with that. Of course there are policy issues that relate back to who are the event organizers. This all gets complicated. Some of it is probably going to be set by legal precedent more than anything else. It is a work in progress. The situation you described to me sounds like it is more of a state issue. Do you agree with that, Robin?
Yeah I think good guidance in the settlement agreements the U.S. Department of Justice has reached with some of the county fair, state fair type entities. You might look at some of those settlement agreements which clearly articulate the responsibilities for the permanent structures, building that are there that are used for a multitude of activities in contrast to maybe a tent that might be brought in or something that has a different use and with different context. Those agreements are available on the U.S. Department of Justice website at www.ada.gov and if you would go under their section regarding enforcement, you can assess those settlement agreements and get a read on how they are interpreting and how they enforcing that particular arena or area. Okay. We will take the next question, please.
Go ahead, Donna or somebody from your site.
This is Laury Middleson from Tennesse Protection and Advocacy I noticed that this was a wonderful presentation, you have some really great ideas. I am wondering in the book if you cover access other than for people with physical disabilities
Yes, and I probably didn''t do a good job in this presentation of those issues. We do go into detail, if I am recalling this correctly there is a planning, a chapter we talk about advance planning and go into accounting and communications there. We talk about it in the publicity material or having to think about this in the planning process or you won''t be prepared when you actually have the event. It is also a real big part of participatory to events, you know where we have a class or somebody coming in to participate in an activity. And it is a combination of anticipating it before it happens and making sure the people you are working with understand when the time comes there needs to be that accommodation. So you are looking for more of a I''m sorry, does that make it any clearer?
For clarification, in the actual guide itself pretty detailed discussion of eliminating communication barriers and the specifics relating to hearing disabilities, visual disability and cognitive and mental disabilities and some of the considerations regarding instructional materials and information that is presented orally and things of that nature and what considerations in the planning process would need to be taken into consideration.
I guess it is interesting. Been a little bit since we read the book. One of the things we talked about were real time captioning at presentations. Today, we have event streaming, I think it is great. You know? It is really this stuff is really starting to happen a lot more now its becoming more practical too.
Also, the two guides that he had identified, accessible meeting planning guide and the other planner''s guide to barrier free meetings go in great details about the whole issue of communication alternative formats and the use of auxiliary aids, such as interpreters, assisted listening device and obligation to provide those, which we defenitely want to emphasize is a requirement. Next question?
Most of my question was addressed in the field trials question, but I will restate state it just to make sure we cover it. This has to do with soft surfaces, I''m landscape architect A couple of examples come to mind. We have a fund raising sled ride that is going to be offered in next month. The entire surface on a very steep hill on snow. Another example is we have a fireworks show which happens on July 4th on the town beach. What I understand that your question to the earlier question was that we need to make sure that we provide accessible routes to the primary gathering facility and that would cover most of the needs for that event?
Would you think of it in terms of support facilities, like telephones, bathrooms, parking, so forth. Then being able to get to those gathering areas. Basically what you are saying is a good approach, when it comes to providing access in general, providing access in outdoor environments, one you are trying to give people a comparable experience but also at the same time not trying to fundamentally alter the nature of what you are doing. You are also giving people information to make their own choices about how far they want to get into something or so forth. Let me try to put this together in a more specific way. So, yeah, I think that part of doing that, you can come here, you can be with the crowd. You can come and understand what is going on and make a decision about how far you want to go. Does that make sense?
It does, thank you.
Just to note there also have been significant research been done about trail services and beaches and things of that nature and much of that resource is available on the U.S. access board website again, because they are part of, as Rex was noting earlier, the recreation guidelines that were released by the U.S. access board, final guidelines a few months ago do go into quite a bit of detail around getting to event he is and, getting to the water and then once I''m in the water that is obviously fundamentally altering it to drain the pool so I can get in but getting me to the water that would include getting me to the beach and to the activity on the beach and different types of surfaces that can be used, which do not destroy the nature of the event, but do create a stable, firm, slip resistant surface in a temporary or permanent solution is available and there is quite a bit of information in those regulation and accompanying documents to facilitate that.
Rem is going to have the first question. We have a number of very popular street festivals that rely on booths for display of either art or books. We have one of the largest we have the largest book fair in the country. In some cases, the booths would be accessible to a wheelchair the way it is illustrated in the guide that we have in other cases, they would not be and I would imagine that trying to replace those booths, given how many there are of them would be prohibitive to these nonprofit organizations. What are their responsibilities for accommodations in this case?
Okay, is there is a reason why the booths are inaccessible?
Just the way they are structured, they are not wide enough.
Okay, not wide enough. Wide enough. Wide enough. We have an instance where they are not accessible and to make them accessible would be prohibitively expensive to the sponsoring agency. That is what you are saying?
Right.
And I would say that I would look at this is a nonprofit, then their obligation is to do, see if you agree with this, Robin, I would say their obligation, talking about readily achievable. They have got to do something, they can''t do nothing. They have got to do something. They have to think in long terms saying yes we do have to make it successful over the course of time. We have to make a plan and we are going to do that year by year. I don''t think you can say, it is not going to happen. I don''t think that is because I unless you were saying we were not going to have these events beyond a certain number of years, which you wouldn''t want to say. The main thing for this organization would be to say we have to deal with issues, we have to get a plan and we have to start doing something, maybe a certain amount of booths we are replacing year by year and we are going to really focus on our procedures and policies to compensate for the fact that we have inaccessible booths, we are going to maybe fuse our inaccessible booths along with some auxiliary displays to help the situation. Thinking through this on the talking about it. Sounds like you are in a transition phase with this organization. I don''t think like I said, I don''t think you can do nothing, have to do something.
I think that also from experience in working in this arena that having individuals who would be able to bring materials out to the area that is accessible, having lifting of materials that might be available to provide somebody so they could get an idea what might be available, ask for certain things to be brought to them so they would have ready access to them, looking at alternative methods to get the information so I have access to what that product is maybe not actually being in the booth, but an alternative way. Now with technology and things where we are using computer lifts and generating inventories and electronic means and things , there might be ways to look at it from that perspective, using digital camera photos, things of that nature as different alternative way to display those materials.
And nonprofit still a public accommodation if is it is not associated with the state if it is not you super funded if it is not a state program, truly independent nonprofit it is public accommodations it is still obliged to make changes.
Ask another question if I may.
Yes.
My name is Dan Folder. If we have a stage and it is a Title II facility, we have a temporary stage going up and know who is going to be on the stage and know we are not going to have anybody with a disability up there, are we still required to put a ramp on the stage?
Now this is a title this is state public sorry, is this public accommodation? State and local government?
Title II, which should be state and local government. I would like an answer for both state and local government and public accommodations.
If, well in terms of the public accommodation, it is more like, I would say probably by this point, yes, you should be. Answer the first part. Not necessarily, if you know you don''t have a need, I don''t know you are required to go to the effort and expense to put the ramp on, as long as there is not an issue with the audience interacting with the performer that would require the audience, you know, coming on the stage or some back and forth in that regard that would be an important thing to consider. I think you can probably make a case you wouldn''t have to put the ramp on, feel a little more comfortable in saying this in terms of the public accommodation than state and local. Do you have an upon that Robin?
I think the issue would be whether we are talking about new construction, new purchase, versus an existing facility as well. Again, the issue being that if I''m purchasing a temporary stage that it is going to be used, that I definitely should be considering that I''m purchasing the elements and the pieces that were created to be in an accessible environment if I''m building a permanent or semi permanent stage structure, I need to build it the ADA is not about build it and they come it is build it and they shall come. We should be prepared for those issues. On a case by case basis, if you knew and it is going to be very situational, as Rex said, do you know their audience, will there be no potential for audience interaction that would preclude or eliminate from someone being able to participate and its not equivalent to say the person was at ground level versus state levels because the purpose of a stage was to increase visibility of the event and activity. That would not be deemed as equivalent.
A real good point you make, I want to re-enforce it, if you are going to buy something new, buy it accessible. You never know what is going to happen.
These are usually leased. My concern would be not telling them they wouldn''t have to have it accessible if they didn''t have somebody with a disability up there, would strongly be a disincentive to have somebody with a disability up there.
For me, I would try to avoid getting into the situation of having to worry about it.
Thank you.
Go ahead.
We have three questions. [ inaudible ]
Just a second, we are going to have to drop you if you cannot create a better line or
Can you hear me now
We are getting a lot of feedback.
Can you hear me at all?
We are still getting feedback. Go ahead and but we may have to cut you off. Go ahead.
The first question is can you repeat the website to get the packet?
The packet being which packet?
The packet that is for the event.
For this particular session?
Yes.
Okay. The materials are posted under this session at www.adagreatlakes.org. You would link on that page to this session. You will see it highlighted as a distance learning session. Just click on it. And you will find a links to all of the copy of the slides and resources and such.
Okay. The second question I have to do is with ground services again. Based on your experience carnivals and fairs that are physically on a large grassy area or an event at a beach what have those facility organizers done to address those ground surfaces. Have they put down a special mat or what have you seen based on your experience?
Well, this is also an issue that comes up in temporary parking lots too. But the ground is a relative term there are some that are pretty good, compacted, stable, like the fair area we have here where I live. You can get around pretty well. So the only other option is to put down some kind of a surface, something like you see at in the playgrounds. You will see these surfaces they lay down, kind of soft, lay over the dirt. I''m trying to think. There are some option for laying down surface. I think that would be more appropriate, like at a beach setting, so forth, were you really can''t get away from the nature of the ground, it is just going to be sand. I think in a lot of other areas where you are having events, you shouldn''t have those problems, or at least not till it rains.
You also see plywood used or boardwalks being built, but again, the securement and things are very critical issue there is to make sure that they are stable surfaces and that it is not just a piece of plywood thrown down that is going to be flopping on an uneven surface.
Unfortunately, a lot of times, you can get by with putting stuff on the ground, but it is usually a short distance solution. There is nothing I know that you can go out and roll a lot of stuff that will take care of it, like, long, long areas of walkway. I think there was one instance where I saw people put out carpeting, which worked, in this one particular instance people were walking up and down by the river. Watching boats float down the river. That kind of worked, but that was kind of odd there is other problems with using carpet and bunching up and so forth. This is tough its tough when you get into long distances, where the ground isn''t good. You need to start thinking of alternative site or alternate route.
The question I have, the last one is that when there are bleachers put up on the sand, for example over here we have surf meets and we have beach volleyball and all that you are saying to get that route from a parking space to the bleachers and the bleachers themselves still have to have accessible wheelchair spaces on the sand?
Right. When you say bleachers, you mean like a structure, actual built structure?
Temporary, typically.
Yeah, if it is a temporary structure, then the standards apply to it. That is the goal. You should have a route from the parking to the stand and a place accessible once you get there. But it sounds like it would be on a structure itself, not necessarily in the stand. Make any sense?
There are bleachers that are often set up in the stand for beach volleyball or other kinds of events at the beach front and portable structures brought in and the standards would apply to them in regards to having integrated seating to the maximum extent feasible.
Depend a lot on who is having the event. Maybe in that case, you can have seating adjacent to, if it is a fairly small scale thing we are talking about here. It maybe is okay to have accessible parking spaces next to the stands.
There are if there are fewer than 30 seats 300 seats, you can do clustering.
That is the area requirement. The standards.
Right. Right.
That is a good way to put it. We talked to some degree about assembly area, assembly seating in temporary situations in the book. It gets kind of interesting. So, probably the best thing to do is refer back to that portion of the book.
Thank you. Next question?
Thank you, Mona or someone from your site please.
This is Mona from ADA partners, I am with the Region 10 northwest DBTAC. My question is when you have the temporary events such as political rallies and they offer entertainment features, let us say pony rides or balloons, you know, were you jump up on the balloon and stuff like that you do have children with disabilities, what is the extent they need to make them accessible?
You get back to the fundamental nature issue. The intent of the law is not to change the fact that people want to jump around on balloons but the law may affect can you get there and does the person have their ability to make their choice about it will. And think it would be more procedure issues, you know, will have like a parent can accompany their child, maybe this is a time where it is acceptable to make that exception. So, you know, here again in terms of I think it is more about getting to it getting information about it, you may not necessarily change the fundamental nature of the activity, riding the pony is still riding the pony, I think you can make that accessible.
Let us say like the hayrides, you have the big unit on the back of the horses for the hayride and would they need to make them accessible to get on and off it?
Ultimately that is what you want. I''m trying to think that is one instance where I want to go back and look into Access Board look for some kind of press dent for that.
There would be some obligation to look at how they could create access on and off of the rides. And that could be done through ramping or could be done through other type of, you know, method of, you know, getting on, like a portable lift or something that might lift, you know, someone up. But again it would be case by case as to what kind of device are they using, what kind of ride it is, you know, like using we were talking about the jumping up, you know, would you definitely want to refer to the U.S. Access Board''s play area, recreation, I''m sorry, play area guide lines that would address what would be the requirements for someone to access some of the soft play type, you know, devices and such.
Yeah, I guess if you wanted to, just in my opinion, if you wanted to take something like, you say jumping on the balloons, you mean like the air filled rooms?
yeah.
I don''t know if there is much, other than getting up to it you could do, because you would start to change what it is. In the case of a hayride, you have more opportunity, a flat level surface, somebody can get on and off it, sitting on it. Make it accessible without changing the nature of it maybe that is not really an excuse in terms of a hay ride. Expect some level to access the ability of that in some way, I might be more willing to say it should be access anybody some respects.
Thank you.
Go ahead.
We had question back when the lady was speaking about her son not being able to get to the third floor. On that, wouldn''t a if this was a state fair, first of all, A, wouldn''t they need to provide accessibility to it, and B if they didn''t, wouldn''t this be the time to file a complaint?
You know, now I think about it, this is assuming that the state owns that building. There may be if the state is leasing the building from somebody else, there may be another issue to that, but I feel like at this point, it should be accessible and it maybe the bounds of a complaint. I don''t know, there may have been something filed similar to this in the past. I looked through some of the department of justice stuff on their website, but it is not coming to me now. I feel like at this point that shouldn''t be happening.
All right, thank you.
Go ahead Marcia or someone from your site.
This is Linda Henry again. I had a question, for a number of the ADA and physical access and things like that, there are check lists that can be used to assess accessibility. Has there been any kind of a check list developed yet that would walk an entity through evaluating access for their temporary event?
Well, we started to do that in this publication, unfortunately, we just didn''t have the resources to get through that, that process. We did some investigating into other what other folks also done or people had done about a check list. One of the issues about our book is so broad, essentially you have to have a check list that could be like you would for any facility, we cover everything, all these different things. Some of the other books I mentioned that are more focused on accessible meetings and planning meetings do have check lists in them and they are more focused on a conference center, so forth. Again, you are generally following a structure, as far as the site goes, you are following pretty much your basic check list for compliant features regardless and putting in the additional elements of the temporary structures you may bring in. Then considering at the same time the activities and how the activities to structures and the permanent facilities all interact with each other, how people are traveling, communicating across those three elements. Is that helpful any or?
Yeah, thank you.
Something they have addressed temporary events, part of that is because they are so diverse in nature, it would be a long list.
It would be recommended, I think that any entity that was holding or doing temporary events would look at and break down the various activities that they had of their own temporary event and then look to the existing guidelines and existing check list and, you know, apply those check list and, you know, apply those to that site there is such diverse knit what is temporary event. Would you have a check list that was 200 pages long and it may not a lot of those things may not be applicable its a case by case, site by site or type of event by type of event check list an entity should look to for their own use as they have their events, they know their events best.
In the book, in the "accessible temporary events" book, if you read the advanced chapter, there are times we don''t have check lists but break things into points. Different things to consider or different areas that you should we kind of conceptually break it down into areas of the event. We don''t really have a check list.
Next question please.
We have a wheelchair program here where first come, first served attendees can check out wheelchairs and we are thinking about eliminating that program. Is there a standard protocol ratio for number of wheelchairs on site for attendees, if we did eliminate or if we decided to keep the program?
What is the context this is happening under? This program is for what kind of event?
Just all events, customer service type situation, where we have had the wheelchairs for customer relations.
These are for temporary events?
Temporary events, yes.
And want to know you are discontinuing the practice of having wheelchairs available for people or discontinuing the practice of making them first come, first served?
Looking at discontinuing the program totally to have it because of maintaining the wheel chairs and also due to some loss of wheelchairs.
I''m a little confused with your question. I don''t know that the in the sense of a public accommodation is responsible to provide a wheelchair for somebody. I don''t I guess there is a situation that could happen, but in general purposes, I think it is probably not. I''m a little more confused, if it were a government program, there would be a program issue requiring that would possibly exist. I don''t know I don''t know if your issue is one of ADA or not. It may be an issue of what is good policy for you to be doing or not.
The Title II regulation of the ADA very specifically do contain language that talk about personal device and personal services are not required by an entity. So, you know this is very common, you see in many facilities, you have got major retail outlets that will provide motorized, I think all pretty familiar of going into a major retailer and there being available motorized carts for use of their customers. Again, those are not something the ADA mandates entities to have, something entities identified as a customer service issue, but wouldn''t be a legal obligation for them to provide those. The accessible route, not denying someone the use of a wheelchair in that environment would be something required, but the personal device itself would not be required that would hold true under Title II of the ADA as well.
I don''t want to discourage you from doing that
Right. There is a difference between what is best practice and what might be a legal obligation.
I understand.
Go ahead.
I''m on the governor''s accessibility in New Hampshire. What I brought in myself personally is going to an outside event where they have the port a potties but don''t have the accessible one and they say the reason is it costs too much.
Not really a reason to say that. One of the things clearly called out about these situation notice guidelines here again, you get bang to what kind of entity is it state, local, public accommodation, I think a public accommodation would have a little bit I''m sorry
Yes, public accommodation.
More leeway to say we can''t do it maybe right now but we know we are going to have to do it eventually. They may. The ADA, going on 12 years now? A little bit long but late in the game to be saying that I would be skeptical of that.
Okay. And I have a quick question that is just do you know of any device that would deter people from removing the orange cones so they don''t park next to vans?
Bolt them into the ground.
I think we have illustration in our book where we use concrete cinder blocks and boards. Well, you know, you got the big construction barrels, they are a little better, but no, I can''t help you with vandals.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. Unfortunately, we are at the end of our time here. We have had a very actively involved 90 minutes of discussion on a whole host of topics and I think that it is probably fairly obvious to all of you here that when it comes to the issue of temporary events there are a lot of gray areas because so much is involved in who is the entity and what is the activity itself and what is the nature of it and whether or not there is an actual standard or is it a policy procedure or other type of approach that needs to be taken. Rex, at this point, I will let you, if you have any closing comments or anything before we wrap up?
No I think that is a really good point to make. Here again, just remember there are gray areas but there is a lot that is possible and just when off temporary event, people assume they don''t have to do anything, but yet they do have to do something, although again it can be situational. Other than that I just want to say I appreciate you having me here today.
Thank you very much. For those of you on the call who did not get your question answered, I do encourage you to contact your disability and business technical assistance center from your region, do that the 800 949 4232. In addition, Rex did make a reference to a document that is not on the resource list, I would just like to make sure that people who may be interested it is related to the accessible exhibition design, created by the Smithsonian institution who is a leader in accessibility in this area. We are actually going to be having a distance learning session on the issue of accessible exhibit and things of that nature in August. So I''m of this year, you may be interested then and can check out. For more detail. But if you really want to access the guide itself it is available on the Smithsonian''s website which is you the just www.smithsonian.org and you can look it up in there, doing their search, just do accessibility and the first thing under that that comes up is the design accessible exhibition design document itself, which can be viewed and downloaded directly from their website. So, that is a good resource. I would like to refer you to the fact that next month, our distance learning session will focus on accessibility of the information technology world beyond just web accessibility. Sometimes we focus so much on accessible web sites, we forget about other things such as information kiosks and photocopy machines, video machines, things of that nature. This session is scheduled for February 18th and it will feature Jim Tobias, who is the president of Inclusive Technologies. Again, more information is available from your regional disability and business technical assistance center about that session and potential registration. As I stated earlier, a transcript, a written transcript of this session will be posted to our website within the next week, as well as the digital recording of this session, if you wish to relisten or review some of the information. I would like to thank all of you for joining us today and have a good rest of the day wherever you might be. Thank you very much.