A newly launched state task force is only the second in the nation to look closely at reforming policies that have gone unchallenged for decades.
Colorado Cross-Disability Coalition
Posted inPolitics and Government
Navigating Denver’s snow-covered sidewalks is dangerous, and often impossible, for people with disabilities
Unplowed and icy walkways impact all pedestrians, but they are even more challenging for people who use wheelchairs, walkers and other mobility devices to navigate.
Posted inColoradans, COVID, Health, Housing
In a Colorado long-term care facility during coronavirus, and desperate to get out
Kevin Mooney had spent his career at a bank in Phoenix, when he was laid off in 2010. They gave him a lovely crystal statuette to recognize his quarter century of service — before showing him the door. Then in his late 50s, Mooney was terrified that he wouldn’t ever be able to find work again. […]
Posted inColoradans, COVID, Health
For Colorado’s rural seniors, coronavirus strains access to home-based care — just as it’s needed most
Gary Wilkie never wants to go back to a nursing home, but the 79-year-old knows that without more people in his life to support him, he may need to. Wilkie spends most of his days alone in a one-bedroom apartment on the third floor of an affordable-housing complex in Durango. He watches television to pass […]
Posted inBusiness, Health, News
Accessibility challenges persist in many rural Colorado communities
Rural counties across Colorado are reopening, but not for everyone. Restaurants, bars, parks, stores, ski areas and trailheads closed this spring for several weeks or months as the nation began feeling the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many considered restrictions to public spaces unprecedented. But not much changed for Kelsey Bell. Parked cars recently filled […]
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, COVID, News, Politics and Government, Technology, Transportation
30 years after passage of Americans with Disabilities Act, key inequities remain in Colorado
During high school and early in college, the record of Naomi Morrow’s schools or employers doing much of anything to accommodate her impaired vision was spotty at best. Morrow, now 42, worked in a hospital laundry running the washing machines, and managers let her put colored Braille bump dots on various controls. Her parents mainstreamed […]
Posted inColoradans, COVID, Health
Anxieties familiar and new persist for Coloradans living with disabilities during coronavirus
Take what you know about the complications and hurdles COVID-19 has thrown into most Colorado lives since March. Then imagine navigating all that while living with a significant disability, and multiply what you were thinking by many times more. The family of Bennett Lewis, 19, knows they have been fortunate to keep their developmentally delayed […]
Posted inUncategorized
Medicaid law forcing caregivers to be tracked by GPS inspires privacy backlash from Colorado’s disabled community
“We’re disabled, not criminals!” shouts one petition. In impassioned, monthly conversations over the last year, members of Colorado’s disabilities community have implored state officials to temper a new federal requirement to track caregivers via GPS. The point of the federal law is to reduce Medicaid fraud by requiring therapists, respite workers and nurses to log […]