Klein takes on City Hall

   Political outsider and KC mayoral candidate Henry Klein wants the city government to do more for people with disabilities. In the process, he's taken a jab at City Hall.

   Klein has issued a proposal to strengthen the Mayor's Office on Disabilities. Klein, who volunteers his time to work with disabled adults at a Methodist church, wants the office to be more involved in housing, transit and other issues involving accessing services.

  Part of the reason behind is proposal, Klein says, is that the current Mayor's Office on Disabilities is "dormant." In a statement, he added: "Our aging citizens and those with disabilities have been without an active office that can properly identify and respond to their issues and concerns."

   Well, a few people at City Hall take issue with that.

   It's true that the person who officially occupied the Mayor's Office on Disabilities has retired. It's also true that on one part of the city's Web site, the telephone number given for the office is actually the Action Center, which takes complaints on all city subjects.

   But there are a couple of people inside City Hall who still identify and respond to concerns related to disabilities. One is an Americans with Disabilities Act specialist in the capital improvements office. The mayor also has an assistant, Pat Gallagher, who handles many of the issues of the Office on Disabilities. She, for instance, has worked to provide more accessible parking on streets downtown.

   Yet, even she admits the Mayor's Office on Disabilities has never been influential. And Klein's intent is to raise the profile of that office.

Posted by Jeffrey Spivak

Comments

There's a difference between an "aging population" and people with disabilities...don't lump them together.

Klein = shady, shady politics

Shady politics? Perhaps the adults with developmental disabilities, with whom Henry has volunteered for 18 years, might question that. Or the adults he has taught to read through the literacy program where he volunteers. Or the people for whom he has helped build homes with Habitat for Humanity. Or... you get the picture.

Wanting to help people with disabilities is "shady"?