Disabled residents have support

KINGMAN - Because of Bullhead City's and much of the area's short history, the public buildings in the Tri-state are generally accessible for the disabled.

With more than 10,000 people in the area with some kind of disability, the Tri-state offers disabled residents transportation, support groups, entertainment and financial assistance, making their lives a little easier.

Eric Beiningen has worked as a defense attorney with the legal defender's office for most of the eight years he has lived in Mohave County. Born with spina bifida, a birth defect of the spine, he has been confined to a wheelchair his entire life.

A resident of Bullhead City, he drives himself to the legal defender's office every day in Kingman, wheeling himself back and forth to court across the street from his office. He said he has not joined any support groups in the area.

Because Bullhead City and Laughlin are relatively new cities, the buildings are more likely to be designed for wheelchair access. Growing up in South Dakota, he said some of the buildings back east, such as at Northern State University where he went to college, did not have elevators, making it tough, if not impossible, to access higher floors, Beiningen said.

The terrain in Bullhead City and along the Colorado River is also relatively flat, making it easier to get around. Some sidewalks and curbs have cuts, allowing people in wheelchairs to get around. One drawback he has found at some of the Laughlin casinos is the plush carpet that makes it harder to wheel his chair through the gaming rooms.

Orlando and Etta Hartford's 11-year-old daughter, Cynthia, suffers from congenital cytomeglo-virus. While on his dangerous duty as a firefighter and paramedic with the Bullhead City Fire Department, Orlando may have been exposed to a virus, which led to his daughter's condition during her conception.

Etta said pushing her daughter's wheelchair into stores or utility companies is hampered by a lack of automatic doors or wheelchair ramps onto the sidewalk. She also said many restaurant bathrooms are lacking in wheelchair accessibility. She also asks people who are not disabled not to use a bathroom stall designed for those in wheelchairs.

Etta has organized a group called Bullhead Area Parent Partnership, which helps parents of special needs children make their lives more positive.

The group has worked with the Bullhead City Parks and Recreation Department to modify playground equipment to make it more accessible to children in wheelchairs. The group's other goal is to add a voice for parents of children with special needs in the state Legislature.

Orlando said having a daughter with special needs allows him to be more familiar with other families who may have a relative with special needs whom he meets in his job as a paramedic/firefighter.

Vernon Gerhardt, 88, is the vice president of the Vision Impaired Person's support group that meets once a month in Bullhead City. Gerhardt, like about 60 percent of the 40-60 people who attend the meetings, suffers from macular degeneration. One goal of the group is to supply magnifying readers to people with limited vision. The readers magnify the print of magazines, books or newspapers about 60 times, allowing people who are visually impaired to read.

Gerhardt usually has someone take him when he goes out. His wish is to find more transportation for the visually impaired to go to their doctors, shopping or to restaurants.

The Vision Impaired Person's support group meets at 1 p.m. the fourth Thursday of each month at the senior center, located at 2275 Trane Road. The VIP support group tries to loan members the read/write units that allow members to read text up close. The group's dues are $1 a year and members must attend the monthly meeting at least five times per year. For more information about the group, call 928-565-2275.

A meat cutter for Smith's Food and Drug Center and other stores for 28 years, retiree Don Brink, 71, also attends meetings of the Vision Impaired Person's support group. Legally blind because of diabetes, Brink also lost his leg from just below the knee to the disease. However, he is able to walk with a prosthetic leg.

Living in a senior apartment complex in Bullhead City, Brink's children or a caretaker takes him to the store or on other errands. He also takes Bullhead Area Transit Service or the county senior bus service, but one has to notify BATS a day in advance and sometimes a week in advance for the senior bus service if they have a disability.

Brink enjoys going to the blackjack tables or the slot machines in Laughlin. Only able to read his own cards up close, the blackjack dealer will tell him or other vision impaired gamblers what the dealer's showing cards are, he said.

Bullhead City resident Lee Bias suffers from multiple sclerosis, which she has had for about 30 years. She has been in a wheelchair for the last four years. Before that, she worked as a waitress and raised her children. She now takes an expensive shot that stabilizes her disease, which has no cure. However, if the shots she now takes were affordable years ago, she would now be better off physically. Shots such as Avonex that cost as much as $1,500 a month are too expensive for most people.

Because her street does not have a sidewalk, Bias cannot take her wheelchair around her neighborhood. She also avoids the street because of the traffic. Most of the Laughlin casinos, shopping centers and government buildings in and around Bullhead City are handicapped accessible for wheelchairs, but many restaurant restrooms throughout the area are not, she added.

Bias, 56, who moved to Bullhead City more than 10 years ago, praises the MS support group in Bullhead City but does not go to the meetings herself. She does not go anywhere without her husband pushing her regular chair. Her motorized wheelchair is too heavy to tote around by herself, she said.

For more information about the MS support group, call 928-758-3561.

Source:
Mohave Valley News, NV