{"id":1657,"date":"2023-09-19T15:40:47","date_gmt":"2023-09-19T22:40:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dredf.org\/web-log\/?p=1657"},"modified":"2023-09-19T17:41:37","modified_gmt":"2023-09-20T00:41:37","slug":"claiming-historic-status-does-not-relieve-inn-of-ada-obligations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/2023\/09\/19\/claiming-historic-status-does-not-relieve-inn-of-ada-obligations\/","title":{"rendered":"Claiming Historic Status Does Not Relieve Inn of ADA Obligations"},"content":{"rendered":"

September 19, 2023<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"A
Photo by Markus Winkler<\/a> on Unsplash<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This blog is an update to \u201cBeing \u2018Polite’ Does Not Ensure Access,\u201d published on August 18, 2023.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

After DREDF\u2019s blog post entitled \u201cBeing \u2018Polite\u2019 Does Not Ensure Access<\/a>\u201d was published, the owner of the 1802 House Bed & Breakfast Inn\u2014who is also the former owner of the hotel at issue in the upcoming Supreme Court case of<\/em> Acheson Hotels LLC v. Laufer<\/em><\/a>\u2014\u00a0added a banner to the Inn’s website stating “WE ARE NOT ADA COMPLIANT. WE APOLOGIZE FOR THE INCONVENIENCE.\u201d Later, a \u201cPolicies<\/a>\u201d page was added to the website, stating in relevant part:<\/p>\n

\u201c1802 House Bed and Breakfast is not able to provide accessible lodging since the establishment is listed on the National Register of Historic Places under the National Historic Preservation Act (16 U.S.C. 470 et seq.) or is designated as historic under State or local law (\u00a7 36.405 Alterations: Historic preservation.). Thus, completing accessible alterations would destroy the historical significance of the property.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Although these updates may technically satisfy the ADA\u2019s \u201cReservation Rule\u201d by telling potential visitors that the Inn is not accessible to disabled people and that no accessible features are provided, they also raise other concerns.<\/p>\n

First, inaccessibility is not merely an \u201cinconvenience.\u201d Ensuring accessibility through compliance with ADA Standards is one of the most critical and uncompromising purposes of the ADA. Trivializing accessibility barriers and failing to comply with the ADA reflects ableism and signals to people with disabilities that they are unwelcome and do not belong. This, in turn, causes people with disabilities to experience significant dignitary harms, and to feel excluded from the mainstream and not in control of the decisions that affect their daily lives.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

Second, being listed on the National Register of Historic Places or designated as historic under State or local law does not completely exempt places of public accommodations like inns and hotels from compliance with the ADA. Read more on the ADA\u2019s actual, limited, exceptions for qualified historic properties<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Finally, we visited the National Register of Historic Places<\/a> and Maine\u2019s Cultural & Architectural Resource Management Archive<\/a> to fact-check the claim that 1802 House Bed and Breakfast is listed on the National Register of Historic Places or designated as historic under State or local law.<\/p>\n

Surprise!\u00a0 It\u2019s not.<\/p>\n

Again, being polite doesn\u2019t work. Providing businesses with notice and an opportunity to do the right thing doesn\u2019t work. The experience of people with disabilities over the 33 years since the ADA was passed has proven this to be true time and time again. Many places of public accommodation will do anything in their power\u2014including misrepresenting a historic designation<\/em>\u2014to avoid complying with the ADA. This ongoing animus towards people with disabilities is the reason private enforcement of the ADA remains essential.<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> See, e.g., Stacey Menzel Baker, Jonna Holland and Carol Kaufman- Scarborough, How Consumers with Disabilities Perceive \u201cWelcome\u201d in Retail Servicescapes: A Critical Incident Study, 23 J. of Serv. Marketing 160, 167-168 (2007).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

September 19, 2023<\/strong>
\n
Accessibility is not just a convenience, it’s an affirmative obligation. Continue Reading Claiming Historic Status Does Not Relieve Inn of ADA Obligations<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[89,66],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ada","category-americans-with-disabilities-act"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4MGYT-qJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1657"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1657\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1662,"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1657\/revisions\/1662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.dredf.org\/web-log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}