Liam Doyle Interview

Original Recording Date: March 2019

In this interview, Liam Doyle discusses:

• Maneuvering in inaccessible areas and how to go about making change
• Places/events in Acadiana that are accessible and wheelchair/mobility friendly
• Tips on traveling-advance preparation- for traveling in a wheelchair

Transcript

Mary (00:09):

Hello everybody and welcome back to This Ability Podcast. I'm your host, Mary Baudoin. With us today, we have Liam Doyle. Liam, thank you so much for joining us. Today's topics: We're going to be talking about maneuvering in an inaccessible area and how to go about making possible change to that, any obstacles that may be in your way, places in advance in Acadiana, in Lafayette, Louisiana, that are accessible and wheelchair and mobility friendly, and then also tips on traveling and any type of advanced preparation that you may have to do if you're in a wheelchair. So Liam, thank you so much for joining us today.

Liam (00:42):

Absolutely. Thank you for having me.

Mary (00:43):

I'd love for you to tell our audience a little bit about yourself.

Liam (00:46):

My name is Liam Doyle. I am the Disability Awareness Coordinator for Lafayette Consolidated Government and I started that position back in November of 2017. I'm a new member of the 30-year-old club. I just recently turned 30.

Mary (00:59):

Happy birthday.

Liam (01:00):

Thank you. It was about a week ago. It was Mardi Gras Day actually. I've been working with the city for officially a little over a year, a year and change. I've been volunteering through the Disability Awareness Committee, which the city hosts the Mayor-President's Awareness Committee for Citizens with Disabilities. That's the official title. I've been working with that committee for about four years roughly. I was a member for about six months, I want to say. I started back in 2015 and then they made me chair. After that, I was chair for about two and a half years, and then it got to the point where I was doing so much work outside of that one-hour-a-month meeting that I was able to go to Mayor-President Robideaux and say, "Hey, I would like to make a position. This is kind of what I want to do," and that kind of turned into my job.

Mary (01:40):

In the year plus that you've been there, what would you consider some of your greatest achievements?

Liam (01:44):

Well, I think that just by having that position, it's a great achievement in and of itself. I am one of two disability awares or awareness coordinators in the state. Affairs or awareness ...

Mary (01:57):

Okay.

Liam (01:57):

I'm one of two in the state. I did a lot of research as far as the region, Louisiana, North Louisiana, New Orleans, Houston. There really wasn't anything except for the governor's office has a disability affairs office through Governor Edwards' office, and that was the closest thing that I was able to find. And so I used that potential negative as a positive and said, "Let's spin this beyond the cutting edge and be an example for hopefully other cities and municipalities to adopt and say, 'We need someone like this.'" There are a lot of ADA coordinators, obviously as mandated by the ADA.

Mary (02:30):

Within Lafayette, what changes have you been instrumental in helping with?

Liam (02:34):

So we as a city do a lot of work for ADA compliance. Particularly Downtown, I really was the spearhead of a lot of changes that are going to be happening to the Downtown area. We've secured some funds to start changes in the near future, so I was really supportive of that effort and kind of led the charge. I never want to say I'm the only advocate in Lafayette because that's simply not true, but I think that I'm arguably one of the strongest and that's a great thing to be and also comes with a great responsibility so I do not take that lightly. We have just the general awareness. We're having this conversation right now, that, in itself, a big thing because we wouldn't have had this a year ago.

Mary (03:11):

Let me ask you this, Liam, because this has been a topic that came up recently. Within the city of Lafayette, having those Bird scooters throughout the sidewalks in Downtown Lafayette, which is where our podcast is located. I have a daughter, Lexi, who is in a wheelchair. So every time I go out in public, I think about if she would be with me, what obstacles would she need to overcome to get where she needs to go. And whenever we had these scooters throughout Lafayette, they were just blocking the sidewalk. People were just leaving them anywhere. Did you see how that could have been handled a little bit better whenever they were here?

Liam (03:46):

Absolutely. I don't know necessarily how they could have been handled better because that is something that we're going to have to deal with down the line if and when they do come back. But I definitely saw the issue that they brought forth, and so I immediately spoke with Mayor-President Robideaux about, "How do we adjust this?" And from the beginning, I made sure that accessibility was a major factor in, "How do we handle the two scooter companies and how do we make sure that we want them to be here and want them to not impede anyone else?" So that early commitment, strong commitment from LCG to make sure that yes, we want people to use them, but we also wanted to make sure that it didn't prohibit anyone else from going about their day.

Mary (04:25):

It was a hindrance.

Liam (04:26):

Yeah.

Mary (04:26):

And I think for me, just as someone who's been in business for a while, I would think that just as the company, they would look at maybe just having people return them to an actual station that would not be just drop them off anywhere. You can drive it from point A to point B and then park it there, a designated spot, as opposed to just anywhere randomly on the sidewalk, which is what was happening. And it was really becoming an obstacle and something that was a hindrance. Let's talk about buildings in Lafayette. Throughout Acadiana, and I don't know if there's different laws within the ADA for Louisiana or United States, what year did the codes start coming into existence?

Liam (05:06):

So the ADA was signed in 1990. It is about to celebrate its 30th anniversary. The way that works as far as accessibility is concerned, and this is a very generalized version of the ADA, there is something that people tend to think is called the grandfather clause, which means that a building predates the ADA, it is not required to offer any kind of accommodation, and that's not true. Depending on the type of building, there are different requirements. Municipality will have a different set of requirements. A business ...

Mary (05:35):

Like a historical landmark or something.

Liam (05:36):

Yeah. Or a public building versus a university. So there's different sections of the ADA that deal with those in particular. But if it's a public space, if it predates the ADA, they have to provide what's called reasonable accommodation. It's very complicated, but essentially, and I'm paraphrasing, it's any services that a person without a disability can take part in. Or if you're shopping, they have to find a way to get someone with a disability to be able to do the same thing. And if it's a new construction, it has to be fully compliant with ADA standards from day one or they can't open. And again, that's a generalization, but that's basically, as far as buildings, how that works.

Mary (06:11):

Let's talk about events in Louisiana. I think someone told me the number of festivals going on in Louisiana on any given weekend, and there's a lot. We have many within Acadiana. One huge one is Festival International. Do you have any tips or recommendations for people if they're planning to go to Festival International and they're in a wheelchair? What should they expect? What can they look for?

Liam (06:33):

Sure. Luckily, I have been working with the people at Festival for the past few years, both during my time with the committee and now sort of in my official capacity. I serve as their ADA coordinator. I'm able to take what I feel are important issues to them, work with them to figure out how to make Festival as accessible as possible for everyone, and any feedback I get from the community is incredibly welcome. I have a very unique perspective, but it's a very single-minded perspective, not in the sense that I don't want to hear from other people, but it's just I know what I know. I absolutely welcome input. But we have taken a lot of steps in the past few years to really make Festival International in particular, and with our other city-run festivals as well, more accessible to people who want to go there.

(07:15):

So a couple of things we've done is we actually moved the ADA viewing areas on all three of the main stages to where they are better located. A few years back, they were kind of in the middle of the stage ground and we realized that wouldn't work because how would you get there if you're in a wheelchair or walker, anything like that? Additionally, we have added more information on the maps as far as accessibility so it actually notes where the accessible area is, where the accessible portalets are. We have more information on the website and you have an email address that you can email beforehand and that's all available, like I said, on the Festival International website. Those emails actually go directly to me. So if you have specific questions, I'm able to answer those as needed.

(07:54):

So those are just some of the steps. But essentially, we want to make everything we do, and especially Festival because it's such a great festival, we're so lucky to have it here, we want to be able to make sure that everyone gets an opportunity to participate and make sure that they get the best out of it. But I would say as far as if you're planning to go to Festival number one, check the weather, realize that it's in April. Weather can change pretty quickly, but that's just general outside planning to have a weather contingency plan. What I would recommend is if you know the schedule beforehand, familiarize yourself with where you're going to want to go, what you're going to want to see and when. If you're getting food, where do you want to eat? They should have all that information on the maps on the website. So do a little bit of research and figure out what do you want to get out of Festival and, for your particular disability, what kind of steps do you need to take to make sure that you have the best Festival possible?

(08:44):

I can make general recommendations like that. Unless I know specifically what your needs are, it's harder for me to say, "Oh, we'll do this and do that." Definitely, the more research you're able to do beforehand. And again, reach out to me, or someone at Festival and they'll get you in contact with me, and say, "This is what we want to do. How do we go about doing that?" and step in and say, "Okay, this is what you do." But again, just general, have a plan. You should always have a plan. Even if you're not able in going to Festival, you should have a plan. There's a lot to take in and once you get there, it's sort of sensory overload. So having a general plan of, "This is, okay, definitely where I want to go."

Mary (09:16):

Let's go back to the ADA-compliant buildings.

Liam (09:20):

Sure.

Mary (09:20):

If someone is a business owner, let's say they own a restaurant or a store, and it's not up to code, what steps should they start to take? Should they contact the LCG offices for a permit or should they get with a contractor?

Liam (09:35):

So there's a couple different ways you can go about that. We do have a coordinator on staff at LCG who is separate from me. You can reach out to him. He is able to give you all kinds of information. There is also a group called the Advocacy Center. You can reach out to them. They do a lot of work in the community, as far as making ADA upgrades and stuff and making things compliant, and it would be a good idea just to reach out to them and say, "Hey, I'm a business owner. I want to get ahead of it."

(09:59):

Because what they can do if, say, you're a new business and for some reason you're not compliant, if they have someone to advocate on behalf of, they can go in and say, "Okay, you need to make X, Y, and Z changes," and they'll give you a timeline. And if you don't do it, then they would file a lawsuit, which is just a strictly compliance lawsuit. There's no damages, no sort of personal financial gain involved. It's a good way to get ahead of them because they are experts on what the needs are.

Mary (10:23):

Yeah.

Liam (10:23):

So I recommend reaching out to them. They're based in New Orleans where they have an office in Downtown Lafayette in the Chase Tower.

Mary (10:30):

All right, Liam. Let's change the subject to something fun.

Liam (10:33):

Sure.

Mary (10:33):

We all love to travel. However, sometimes when you travel in a wheelchair, you don't know what the accommodations are going to be like in advance. What are some things or tips that you have for people listening whenever they're looking to make plans for a vacation? What's some advice that you would give somebody?

Liam (10:49):

Sure. So I don't travel nearly as often as I'd like, but I do try to travel as often as I can. It's all about research. And depending on where you go, it's going to be easier. I tend to, when I travel, travel to bigger cities that are a little bit more accommodating, as far as their public transit is a little bit better set up. So I love Chicago. It's cold, which I love. I've been to Seattle and we'll get to that in a minute. But I have friends who live in Chicago and I have friends who live in New York so I'll go visit them every once in a while, and it is just night and day. As far as flying, flying sucks in general. Flying in a wheelchair can be hard because you have to deal with the aisle chair, which I really think they should redesign. There's got to be a better way. I don't know if you've ever had your daughter ...

Mary (11:28):

I have not. We've never flown on an airplane and she's 21 years of age because I'm scared of what's going to happen. She has a custom wheelchair.

Liam (11:35):

Right.

Mary (11:35):

It's probably bigger than yours. It tilts backwards because she cannot support herself, so she cannot sit in a regular seat, and so I don't know how that would work on an airplane.

Liam (11:46):

And that's again, for an airline, they would have to be aware of how that worked. For reference, for your viewers, my motorized wheelchair, which is my primary form of transportation because I don't drive, it's 381, so just under 400 pounds without me and it's a big thing. It does tilt. So what I do is I'm able to transfer into what they call an aisle chair, and it literally is they put you in and they strap you in and you go down the aisle and they get you to your seat and you transfer to a seat. Then you're kind of just there for the duration of the flight so make sure you go to the bathroom beforehand because your chair goes under the plane, so it's like, "Cool."

(12:22):

What I ended up doing before I invested in Lafayette as a community, and this was, like I said, four or five years ago, I wanted to move to Seattle. And that was a choice because, number one, the Pacific Northwest is absolutely gorgeous in my mind. The actual reality of that can be a little bit different just because the weather. Hazard for someone like me for the majority of the year, which I didn't factor in. Seattle consistently ranked in the top five accessible major cities.

Mary (12:50):

Nice.

Liam (12:52):

So I was going to change my career path, and I've changed career paths 15 times throughout my academic span, which is going to last 11 to 12 years. I changed my career path again so I was like, "I'm going to get a master's degree and I'll be a professor." It's like, "I can't just move to Seattle. I need a reason," so I was going to go to the University of Washington to get a master's degree. Didn't have a bachelor's, didn't have an associate's, but still at SLCC and I was dreaming big, not really being very practical with my thoughts. What I ended up doing was, "Well, if I'm going to live there, I should go travel there independently."

(13:17):

So I booked a vacation for six days and it was right around the 4th of July. It was maybe a few days before and two days after. Terrible time for me to go because in Seattle, for the months of mid-June to August, virtually no rain, which for anybody else, it's love. If you're trying to get a feel of what it's like to live in Seattle with a wheelchair and you don't have that major component ... It was great because of the weather. It's very pretty. Practically speaking, I should have gone in during the "rainy season," which is the majority. And it's not so much of a heavy downpour, it's more of just a mist in Seattle. It's a constant you're cold, you're wet, and all that. So none of that factored in.

(13:54):

I was super excited. This was the chair before this one. So every four to five years, I get a new chair. That's pretty standard. The last chair that I had, and that one had really heavy hydraulic leg lifts so I could lift either both legs and the foot plates, or individual as needed. And they weighed probably about 50 pounds each. They were really intense. And so what I decided to do when I left was I flew out of Lafayette, from Lafayette to San Francisco, San Francisco to Seattle. I was having some maintenance issues with the chair. I was actually going down the ramp to get to the plane, and one of the rests snagged. The pad, it's just a basic, metal foot plate underneath. So I was like, "Cool, I'll take these off. I'll leave them."

(14:32):

My stepdad had given me a ride. They don't have an accessible van, but they have a trailer. They gave me a ride to the Lafayette airport and I was like, "Great, I'll leave them with him. He'll come back and get them. He's still in the area." So I was like, "Great. I'll get on the plane. They'll get it." I went, got on the plane, left them with the front desk, did all that, did my thing, did the aisle chair, did all that. Got off the plane in Houston and there's my bag. There's the 100-pound legs, carried them around with United and say, "Hey, I don't want these. Send them back to Louisiana like you guys were supposed to." So they were like, "You want us to do what?" And so I literally had to explain the situation. I knew there was no way I was going to be able to cart them around for six days. That was the whole thing. That's Houston. The legs ended up following me all the way to Seattle. They didn't get it.

(15:10):

I finally get Seattle. I have them ship the legs back. When I got to Seattle, it was a smaller plane than the one I was on before so they had to take the back of the chair off to get it to fit on the plane. I did not know how to put the back of the chair back on because I had never taken it off. Took me 45 minutes to find someone who took it off, or at least knew someone who took it off, to figure out how to take it back on so I'm just sitting there. Whenever we finally got it back on, I was good to go. I left SeaTac, which is the major airport in Seattle. I took the light rail, sort of like a monorail or a subway station, but they're really nice and so that was really cool, to my destination. I was sort of Downtown Seattle/kind of near Pikes Market on I think it's Fourth Avenue in Seattle. So I was in that general area, closer to Downtown, kind of near the Space Needle and all that.

(15:55):

What I did was I got on a bus, I didn't realize at the time, but it was the wrong bus. It took me a couple stops and the bus driver realized I was on the wrong bus. And what I ended up doing, because I was in a motorized chair, was after that bus incident, I was like, "Cool, I'm just going to Google Maps it, walk there." So I ended up doing that first couple of ... at least that, got to the hotel, got checked in, got everything. I used mostly public transit. The only really big thing that I needed to do when I was in Seattle was to tour the university. I wanted to get to the university district. Downtown Seattle was a different district so I wanted to be able to go to the University of Washington and kind of do that.

(16:32):

I used public transit, and this was, again, back when I was 22-23, so this was a while ago, and I wasn't as comfortable as I am now with that. There were days when I was just like, "I'm here. I'm doing it. It's going to be great," but there were also days where I was just having a panic attack and spending a day in the hotel room and kind of staying in that general area because it's like, "Okay, I feel comfortable with this." It's any time you go to a city, especially because this is the first time I've traveled alone without any assistance. I had some financial issues because of the hotel because they charge you in advance in case you do pay-per-view or anything like that, so I had money allocated and so I had to deal with that. Being that I was here, my family is back in Louisiana, and they took money that I wasn't expecting, I didn't have a good safety net so I had to deal with that.

(17:16):

That was insane. And that's just a general travel thing because it was the first time that I traveled alone, I didn't know how to do that. Seattle was very interesting because it was a lot of me sort of finding myself and finding out, "Can I live here? Can I do this?" and it turns out that the answer was sort of a gray area. It's like, "In theory, yes." And again, it's just about, for me at least, emotional maturity. I had all these big dreams, going to Seattle and leaving this area, and sort of running, which I don't want to say is a common thing, but I think people with disabilities tend to seek out more accessible areas, which is totally understandable. But I'm so glad that I stayed and I'm so glad that I didn't leave because I'm putting up deep roots here and making changes to Lafayette.

(18:01):

And there's an absolute need here and I'm glad that I stayed, but it was a learning experience because it was sort of an epiphany moment of, "Yes, you can do this." I just recently, last year, went to Chicago to visit a friend of mine, and that's another city that's really, really good. But we went, before that, a few years ago in February. It was in the middle of winter and it was freezing. And the problem that I discovered there is that they do have a good number of accessible subway stations, but some of the elevators are above ground, and every once in a while because of the cold, they'll freeze. So you have to deal with that, being in a wheelchair and how do you handle that?

(18:34):

And my poor sister and my poor friend, it's 25 degrees, it's snowing, they were just so done. I was trying to go to one specific restaurant with my friend that was great. I went previously in the summer and we were trying to go there, and they were so mad at me. What we ended up doing was finding an accessible van rental and, for the rest of the trip, we just used that. On good days, public transit in larger cities is pretty well set up. And again, that's just a research thing is if you're more comfortable in something like Acadiana Transit or something like that, where they come and get you with a lift-equipped van. I was more of the thinking, and this was a little naive on my part, that I was just like, "I'm going to do this. It's going to be fine." In December of last year, I knew right away. What I do is I fly into O'Hare and then I take the blue line, which is in the airport, and literally the blue line ends at O'Hare on one side.

Mary (19:20):

Okay.

Liam (19:21):

So what I do is I take the blue line all the way to Jackson, which is the stop for "Downtown Chicago." And then from there, I actually previously hadn't switched stops. I did that this time because my friend had moved to be closer to The Loop, which is Downtown Chicago. And so he was very much in The Loop, and now he is in a different area of the town so I actually switched trains and did all that. And again, I was more comfortable with it because I had had those previous experiences, learned from them, and I said, "Okay, I need to make sure before I get there." I was in constant contact with him. Even when I landed, it was like, "Okay, which train is it?" and I just made sure.

(19:56):

One of the best things that happened to me was not necessarily one of the scariest, but it was really cool. I have a weird way of viewing things. When we were in Chicago the last time, which was the February trip when it was so cold, my sister and my friend that I was with, we were going back to O'Hare and, again, we took the blue line. They got on a train before I did. They left. I had to wait for the train. And once you get past the whole panic and the crying phase, "You guys left me behind," it's like, "Okay, you have to figure this out. There's going to be another train. It's fine," and that is just a life experience for someone else. It is important for someone with a disability.

(20:29):

It can be incredibly freeing because you figure out that yes, you can do this, can thrive, and not just survive in larger cities. You can take those lessons that you learned in your Seattles, your Chicagos, and take them with you anywhere. And it definitely impacts the way you view not only the way you travel, but the way you view the rest of your life. You said, "I did this, I did this, I did this, and I am better for it." Take those lessons and implement them into your daily life.

Mary (20:56):

Technology, there's so many, especially everyone has a smartphone now. Do you find that there's any apps out there that are very useful for someone that's in a wheelchair if you're traveling, or any apps in general that you like to use?

Liam (21:09):

I don't typically use apps that are related specifically to disabilities. When I travel, I mean, I'll do research. With Lafayette. I have my routes. I know what I'm doing. I know how to get around. I have my routine. I know pretty well how to get from point A to point B, either by myself or with assistance and that kind of thing. I know that in larger cities like New York, a few years ago, they started to do Google Maps for accessibility. So they would actually have a group of people with various disabilities walk around and sort of rate different areas of the city and say, "This stop in particular is accessible. This restaurant is accessible and this one isn't, and here's why." So the information is out there. It's just not something that I personally use for Lafayette. And when I travel, I do, but I'm a little bit more independent when it comes to traveling than somebody else maybe. I'm able to kind of roll with the punches a little bit better, so I have a general sort of accessibility checklist that's going to be different for somebody else.

Mary (22:11):

Well, Liam, I want to thank you so much for being here today. Do you have any final thoughts or any last departing words before we close out?

Liam (22:18):

I know it's scary and I know not only traveling, but just living with a disability can be completely overwhelming and I understand that. And I am much better today than I was two, three, four, five years ago, but I still struggle. There are still days when it's just like, "Why am I doing this? Is it worth it, all this extra effort?" And for me, the answer is yes. And the reason for that is because I decided a long time ago that ... I, for example, get social security benefits and I could have said, "I'm good with this. I can take the money that I get. I wouldn't have to work. I wouldn't have to do anything." Granted, I wouldn't live in as nice a place I do now, and I have a little bit of a higher standard of living because I work and I'm fortunate to do what I do, but it's a choice that we all have to make.

(23:07):

There were times, especially when I was at SLCC. I'm going to talk a little bit about education. It took me five years to get out of high school. I was in Lafayette High from 2003 to 2008. 2007 was when I was supposed to graduate. That took me five years. My two-year associate's degree took me nine years, and there were days when I wanted to quit and there were days when I said, "Is this worth it?" I had transportation struggles, other emotional, physical struggles throughout my career at SLCC. There were days when it was just like, "I can just stop." I just knew that, for me, that wasn't enough. And there's nothing wrong. I want to make that very clear. If that's what you choose to do, there's nothing wrong that. But it's a personal choice and it's a fight because yes, it can be overwhelming. I mean, unfortunate to the point where I, like I said, am able to be a little bit more independent than some people, and I don't want to paint that as a negative. I don't have the restrictions some other people might have.

(24:05):

So if you choose to be independent and if you're on the fence and you want to be independent and you're able, can be any kind of definition for anybody, I would say do as much as you can and as much as you want because it's absolutely worth it. I'm really glad that I didn't give up on myself and set such lofty goals because it made me a better person and certainly a better advocate, something that just takes time. You have to learn how to be able to grow because I couldn't do what I'm doing now five years ago.

Mary (24:34):

Yeah.

Liam (24:35):

I couldn't. If you asked me five years ago what I wanted to do, it was run away to Seattle and go live there. But even two or three years ago, if you asked me what I wanted to do, it wouldn't have been this.

Mary (24:45):

Yeah.

Liam (24:45):

It would've been something similar to this potentially, but I had no idea. And so it's just don't let yourself be your biggest limitation is my biggest advice.

Mary (24:55):

Oh, that's awesome.

Liam (24:56):

Yeah.

Mary (24:57):

Liam, I really appreciate your inspiring words. All of our audience listening, I know that they're going to really appreciate what you had to say. Definitely some words of encouragement, so thank you so much for being here.

Liam (25:08):

Absolutely. Thank you for having me.

Mary (25:09):

All right.

Liam (25:09):

Appreciate it.

Mary (25:09):

Have a good night, everybody. Take care. Bye-bye.