Activists for disabled prompt Harrah’s to upgrade buses

Grace Leong

Monday, Jan. 10, 2000 | 11:13 a.m.

Disabled Rights Action Committee activists are threatening to go to court to shut down Harrah's hotel-casino shuttle bus services nationwide unless Harrah's retrofits the buses to make them compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Las Vegas-based Harrah's Entertainment Inc. has 18 hotel-casinos nationwide and one in Sydney, Australia.

Jan Jones, Harrah's vice president of communications, said shuttle buses in Reno will be retrofitted by Saturday.

"Technically, DRAC is correct and we're going to move to be ADA-compliant by Jan. 15 because we value the business of our handicapped clients," Jones said. "It's not that we're denying transportation to the handicapped. We do offer free wheelchair accessible cab service to our guests with disabilities."

Setting the stage for a mid-2000 trial in a DRAC suit against Harrah's was a Dec. 29 ruling by U.S. District Judge Johnnie Rawlinson, who granted DRAC a preliminary injunction that stops Harrah's and its subsidiaries from operating Harrah's-Reno's three fixed-route shuttle buses after Friday unless the buses are equipped with wheelchair lifts.

Disabled Rights activist Ronald Ray Smith sued Harrah's Entertainment, Harrah's Management Co. and Harrah's Reno Holding Co. on Nov. 19, 1998, alleging they violated the Americans with Disabilities Act because he wasn't able to board any of Harrah's-Reno's three buses that ran on a fixed route between the Reno airport and the hotel in October 1998.

This lawsuit is part of a statewide campaign to bring Nevada's places of public accommodation into compliance with Title III of the ADA, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability by private entities, public accommodations and commercial facilities. The title also requires facilities that are newly designed, constructed or altered to be readily accessible to individuals with disabilities.

"We have to submit a reply brief for a motion of summary judgement, as to whether Harrah's is liable for damages," said DRAC's attorney Richard Armknecht III. "We're also seeking a permanent injunction against Harrah's and other injunctive relief with regard to other properties belonging to Harrah's nationwide."

Harrah's said in a Dec. 27 motion opposing the plaintiffs' motion to shut down Harrah's shuttle bus service that "there is nothing in the record to indicate how a free ride in a wheelchair life-equipped taxi cab, rather than a ride in Harrah's shuttle bus, constitutes any hardship to the plaintiffs."

But Armknecht disagreed. "People with disabilities shouldn't be kept waiting around, while able-bodied people get on board. This is almost analogous to being made to sit at the back on the bus. It's about dignity and being treated equally."

"It's very different from having the freedom to sit wherever you want. This is about being limited in your freedom of movement," he said.

In its motion, Harrah's said it was in the process of retrofitting its two Reno Airport shuttle buses with wheelchair access devices.

Harrah's said free taxi service will be provided for people with disabilities until both retrofitted buses are in operation.

A 1998 suit is pending against another Harrah's resort, the Rio hotel-casino in Las Vegas, alleging similar ADA violations, including failing to equip all the Rio shuttle buses with wheelchair lifts. The plaintiffs are seeking a court order to force the Rio to retrofit all of its shuttle buses.

In a U.S. District Court suit filed Aug. 4, 1998, Smith said he couldn't board the Rio's shuttle buses in June and July of 1998 because two of the four buses lacked wheelchair lifts.

"It isn't fair that wheelchair users have to call for buses with wheelchair access, but the able-bodied don't have to call for the buses. That means the wheelchair users have to wait a longer time," Armknecht said.

Rio Properties' attorney Scott Bogatz declined comment.