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Courtesy Beth Davis-Hofbauer
Beth Davis-Hofbauer is seen with her baby, Amelia. Davis-Hofbauer created a petition on Change.org after she was told that wheelchair users could be accompanied by only one other person while attending events at the Paralympics.
LONDON -- A disabled mother has begun a campaign that has attracted thousands of supporters after she was told she could not sit with her family at the 2012 Paralympic Games because she was in a wheelchair.
Beth Davis-Hofbauer, who runs a company that makes craft boxes for children, raised a petition calling on the Games organizers, LOCOG, to change what she had been told was its ticketing policy, which allowed only one person to accompany someone in a wheelchair. At 12:45 p.m. ET Friday, the petition had 33,847 signatures.
LOCOG then issued a statement saying this had never been its policy, and Davis-Hofbauer said a LOCOG official told her that improperly trained staff had made a mistake.
But, despite being told she now will be able to sit with her family, she vowed to keep on campaigning because she has been contacted by other people with similar complaints.
Davis-Hofbauer, of Fareham, Hampshire, England, said she had tried to get tickets for her, her husband Edward, her autistic son Milo, 4, and daughter Amelia, 19 months, for a cycling event.
When told they would not be able to sit together, she then asked about tickets for the athletics, swimming and basketball, but to no avail.
People being treated 'really badly'
Davis-Hofbauer, who uses a wheelchair due to illness, said she needed her husband to be beside her as he is her caretaker, and the children could not be expected to sit by themselves. She offered to pay full price for the children, and have them sit on their laps, but she said that idea was rejected by the ticket-line operator.
“I felt like the crap on their shoe to be honest, and very guilty because I felt it’s my fault -- because I’m ill and I’m in a wheelchair, my children cannot go,” Davis-Hofbauer said.
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After setting up the petition, she said she was contacted by 11 or 12 people who said they had received “exactly the same kind of treatment,” and had heard reports of more.
"There are people still being treated really badly by them, being ignored by them, being treated like second-class citizens,” Davis-Hofbauer said.
“We disabled people shouldn’t really have families -- we forget that,” she added sarcastically.
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She said she had now been told the family would be able to sit together in the cycling velodrome, but said she would continue to campaign on the issue.
“I think they thought if they sold me tickets I would shut up, but I actually do care about other people so I’m not going to shut up," she said.
'Ironic'
Davis-Hofbauer said stadiums generally should do more to enable wheelchair users to be treated like ordinary sports fans. But she added it was “ironic” that there was a problem with the Paralympic Games. “It makes it sound even worse,” she said.
A LOCOG spokesperson emailed a statement that reads: “it is not our policy that wheelchair users can only be accompanied by one other person when attending the Games.”
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“We designed our venues such that accessible seating will be located around the new venues, at different price points so that wheelchair users can sit with their friends and families rather than in one single designated area, and we included a companion seat in the cost of a ticket for a wheelchair space,” the statement added.
NBC News asked LOCOG to comment specifically on the case, whether other people had made complaints and what was being done about them.
In response, a LOCOG spokeswoman said in an email that, "We have been able to sort a number of customers out, we will always try to help but with less than 2 weeks to the Games it comes down to a question of availability."
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Leave a Comment:
Put the weelshair folks in the center and have the
families sitting left and right from them.That way they can give them the popo pot .
This complaint reminds me of seating families with small children first on airplanes. There's one kid and six adults and all six adults take advantage by boarding early and taking the best seats. If someone needs a caretaker there is no reason they shouldn't be able to take ONE person along with them. Otherwise it can be a situation ripe for abuse- no offense intended to this woman or others in her situation.
If they have area's that are suitable for wheelchairs and everyone wants 4 or more people sitting with them how many spaces in that area will be left for others in wheelchairs.
Where as this would most likely not pose a problem and many places at the paralympics I would expect a larger then normal amount of those needing special seating arangements. ie.. larger spaces between seats or extra wheelchair area's.
It sounds like they waited too late to get their tickets and they could not get all the seats they wanted together with the wheelchair accessible seating. It sounds more like a problem of availability, not policy. I applaud the fact that the London organizers paired each wheelchair accessible seat with an additional seat to guarantee that a person in a wheelchair would not have to be seated alone. You can not wait until the last minute and then get upset because they do not have a wheelchair accessible seat with three other seats next to it still available. This is like waiting till the last minute to book a plane flight and complaining because there are only single middle seats left available so you can not get a whole row for your whole family to sit together.
Actually-people who booked a year ago have also had problems. People who have had their tickets for a while have suddenly been told they can't sit together. There are numerous problems wheelchair users have had so please don't oversimplify it.
AND this isn't about abusing a privelege- and it's really horrible to be repeatedly treated that way when you're a wheelchair user. It's about being able to enjoy events socially, like everybody else, and there is no reason that cannot be worked out. Surely most people would want to sit with their children at an event? To see their faces light up with enjoyment. To just experience it as a family. It is not right, and it is discrimination, to prevent disabled people from doing this. It's an easily solved problem. Modular seating is widely used in many circumstances, such as travel, if they had actually consulted disabled people and considered their needs, the planners could have taken this into account when building the stadium!
There isn't just disabled seating in one area, it is scattered around. It would be an easy problem for them to solve if they so wished. And in the future the use of modular seats would solve the issue.
I would like to climb a mountain in any national park, but unfortunately I am not physically able. Should the state build me a ramp to the top of the mountain, and provide refreshments for me when I get there if I am physically unable to carry them up myself?
Where does it stop?
God knows I have compassion for those with disabilities, but many of us are dealing with limitations.
I always thought the ParaOlympic Venues were the locations used in the Olympics so the Venues should have been built to be accessible by everyone.
This is just another mark on London .
Funny. I always thought disabled people wanted to be treated just like the rest of us.
They do. The rest of us get to sit with our family.
This was very poor planning on the part of the LOCOG. This is not their first rodeo,they should not have such gaps in their employee training program.
Apparently the rule is that people in wheelchairs get one other ticket FREE. But the person at the call center thought they weren't allowed to buy any other tickets.
They probably hired the same idiots who handled the Atlanta games in 1996 and told people from New Mexico that they would have to go through their country's embassy to get Olympic tickets because the call center was only for US citizens.
Beijing had pretty good seating for the Paralympics. I was in a group of 12 with 2 being in wheelchairs and one being blind. Each level of seating had plenty of room for wheelchairs at the front of each section, and chairs right behind, so all of us sat together with the wheelchairs up front. This would have been possible for probably close to 100 groups of our size and needs all around the stadium.
And this is in a country that had almost no thought to wheelchair access anywhere else in the country before those games.
If they managed to figure it out, how is it that this wasn't thought of in London?
i guess i see where they are coming from but its not practical in the least. to be able to accommodate every request under the sun. sorry but most venues have at perm seats, and to remodel the whole thing will make my non disabled costs go up. and im not wiling to take more of a screwing than i already do when going to a stadium etc to see a live sporting event.
It also comes down to you finding out which employees have been telling customers this policy and FIRE THEM. There are TOO MANY people LOOKING FOR WORK.
Being disabled in no way makes you a first second or third class citizen. You are simply a citizen paying for you tickets to an event, the wheelchair should never have come into play. While i don't agree with the policy of the games, there are often no contingency plans for people with families if they are in a wheelchair or have special needs. This is a problem that has plagued the ages but is slowly being turned around. The ticket person may not have been aware of other contingencies or special seating arrangements so i don't blame the games or the ticket person. I blame the slow pace this world has made to make sure every citizen has access to what everyone else has access to. Power to the people. Remember making specific changes to fit the need of the disabled is expensive and time consuming and generally is not covered by the government enforcing the rule so many drag their feet till they are absolutely sued to make the changes. It saves them thousands at your expense. The more you complain though the more they ignore you. Complaints will only get you so far petition or not! Action is required. You need to contact the country of the games, the games organization, and political officials in the country/state/locality of the games to get things moving. A petition while a novel idea has long since passed into history as the preferred way to protest nowadays for example the wall street movement or riot type seems to be and these are bad ideas, just as a side not that still hasn't accomplished anything. You need muscle and the courage to stand your ground and defend your convictions. Hurrah's for you for taking this on, but your gonna need a lot more then signatures on a page, supporter numbers or even an impassioned plea to the media, your going to need major muscle. Keep going and you will have it. I will affix my name to it. London was clusterfrock when it came to this, sad really as stated above this isn't their first rodeo they should have had this done long before it was ever needed. More power to the people!
The usual whining! People want everything handed to them on a plate. Who cares about the paraolympics anyway?
This particular situation sounds like a mix-up made by a poorly trained (and perhaps not too bright) employee.
In general it would not be a huge expense to reconfigure seating areas in most stadiums to accomidate handicap group seating. Having a variety of well designed (not expensive) areas might entice more handicapped folks to go on group outings.
No one is asking for any kind of exceptional privilege. Heck, they are bringing their own seats! Just make some accessable open spaces available from the high priced areas on up to the (lol) economy class.
Sheesh... her baby counts as a "person" who looks after her? That is the only "sin" that I can see. The "one person" for a wheel-chair disablement is to help them push the wheel chair.
I can't imagine why she would want her baby with her in the first place... or is it her baby? A big crowded sports arena and she brings a baby to it? Not the healthiest environment for the child. Personally I think she thinks of herself first (lol she certainly used a lot of cosmetics to pretty herself up for the photos), and not of the baby. And is it even her child?
There was no mention whether her disablement was a temporary or permanent condition, what it was due to, and why she should be allowed to bring a whole raft of people with her and still get preferential treatment. After the one big strong person to help push her wheel chair, she should be restricted to seating that everyone else is subject to in that horrendously crowded arena.
I have brought up a wonderful child who has been physically crippled from birth, due to suffering from a heart attack while still an new infant. I tried to teach him to be the best he can be in a world which demands a lot even of physically normal people.
It is distasteful to him, actually, to be given "preferential treatment" over and above basically necessary physical accommodation in his job and and in his whole life in our culture.
There is something about this article that does not elicit sympathy from my family for the petulant demands of Ms. Haufbauer.
she had two young children - the article said she needed her husband beside her for care taking reasons and did not want her young children to sit by themselves.
HeartsQuest- you're a fool. Loads of healthy people are bringing their small kids- so there's no reason why a wheelchair user should not too. And for your information, if a family has an older kid, and a toddler, and no babysitting, it's quite usual for them to go out as a family.
What this woman personally chooses to do is beside the issue and it just makes you sound arrogant for wanting to know her personal details- this is a problem affecting many people, all of them with different backstories. I'm a wheelchair user with 3 kids- I'd want to be able to sit with them too. Loads of other parents I've spoken to have said the same. It's not a "preferential treatment" it's simply asking for an equal right to sit with your own kids. As for the woman in the article-it was made known that she now has tickets- she's trying to defend other people, people like me now. And I'm bloody grateful for it.
Another example of leveraging a so called disability for 15 minutes of fame. If she was so ill that she requires a constant caregiver then what is she doing wheeling around London attending sporting events. The world has to kiss her *** because she has a disability.
i would never belittle a handicapped person. they live a life way tougher than most. but if there are rules to be followed, follow them. quit playing the pity game. i love you, i respect you, i feel for you. just follow the rules. we all have to.
@atelier,Kiss my @ss! Your disability shows when you Speak!
I would like to climb a mountain in any national park, but unfortunately I am not physically able. Should the state build me a ramp to the top of the mountain, and provide refreshments for me when I get there if I am physically unable to carry them up myself?
Where does it stop?
God knows I have compassion for those with disabilities, but many of us are dealing with limitations.