California town must put a $4 million revenue measure before voters to make accessibility improvements

From the Contra Costa Times in California:

Corte Madera must put a $3 million to $4 million revenue measure before voters by the end of 2015 to fund curb, sidewalk and other disability access improvements after a federal judge signed off on a settlement agreement July 22.

The deal between Corte Madera and disability rights advocate Richard Skaff also requires the town to make numerous street, seating and disabled parking improvements by June 30, 2011, including repairing the sidewalk on Redwood Avenue, installing wheelchair seating in the gazebo at Old Corte Madera Square and putting in a curb ramp at Tamalpais Drive and Willow Avenue.

That work will be part of a street reconstruction project worth approximately $700,000 already included in the 2010-2011 budget, said George Warman, Corte Madera's director of finance.

"The decree into which we've entered provides further assurance that the town will continue to work with due diligence to comply with state and federal disability laws," Mayor Carla Condon said. "It is our utmost goal to remove any impediments to anyone with any disability."

The settlement "is going to impact the town financially, but the long-term results will be in everyone's interests," she added.

Filed in 2008 in U.S. District Court, Skaff's lawsuit contended that Corte Madera streets, sidewalks, trails and parking lots violated state and federal law guaranteeing access to people with disabilities. In a July 6 closed session, the council unanimously approved the settlement, which includes no admission of liability.

After the first phase of projects are completed next year, Corte Madera must establish a fund for subsequent work, the agreement said. The town will then put aside annual sums of either $50,000 or 50 percent of specific gas tax revenues, whichever is greater, and 10 percent of its unrestricted capital improvement expenditures from the fiscal year two years earlier until the revenue measure goes before voters some time between 2011 and the end of 2015.

Corte Madera's unrestricted capital improvement expenditures came to zero last year because of the town's financial problems, which include a projected $3.6 million deficit by the end of the 2010-2011 fiscal year, Warman said.

Skaff is a 66-year-old Mill Valley resident and former Corte Madera mayor who has sued numerous public agencies and businesses to get disability access. He said he hopes town officials frame the revenue measure in a positive light, highlighting its benefits for all residents.

"The sidewalks are just a horrendous mess. There has not been any work done on those for a long time," Skaff said. "This (revenue measure) will give the town management the opportunity and the funding to do that."

Under the settlement, Corte Madera will pay $200,000 in attorney and expert fees to Skaff as well as $25,000 in damages.

Skaff said he plans to put the $25,000 into his nonprofit Designing Accessible Communities, from which he draws no salary.

"We aren't getting any enforcement by the California Department of Justice, so it ends up that individuals have to do the enforcement," Skaff said. "It's really frustrating because I'm one person, and trying to change the world as one person doesn't work very well."

Should the voters reject the revenue measure, the plaintiff will decide whether to continue bankrolling the work through the gas tax and capital improvement expenditures for 15 more years or to seek alternate funding sources, according to the settlement.

The town hasn't analyzed what kind of revenue measure it will select, Assistant Town Attorney John Abaci said.

In 2004, Corte Madera settled an unrelated case with Skaff and subsequently built a ramp and disabled-accessible bathroom at Town Hall, officials said.

About the same time, Mill Valley and Marin County settled with the California Department of Justice, agreeing to improve disability access in their jurisdictions. As part of the Marin County case, officials poured more than $4 million into the improvements. The county continues to spend about $2 million a year on such projects, Disability Access Manager William Campagna said.

San Rafael reached a 10-year settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice in 2004, requiring it to address access problems in city buildings and on public streets, said Richard Landis, the city's Americans with Disabilities Act coordinator.

The city has since completed almost all of the required changes but still has about 400 curb ramps to build, Landis said.

"The city of San Rafael is more accessible than it was before," he said. "It's been a good thing, not just for people with disabilities but for the whole city."