UH Law Center student says new building has accessibility gaps including evacuation plan and doors

Summary

Sarah Douglas, a 3L at the University of Houston Law Center, described access problems in the law school's new building — including stiff doors, lack of sharps containers and no formal fire-evacuation plan for mobility-impaired students — and said campus groups are working with administrators to fix them.

Sarah Douglas, a third-year law student at the University of Houston Law Center, told the public television program Focus on Abilities that the law school's new building contains accessibility problems that have not yet been fully resolved.

“I was very surprised to find that one of the top universities in the nation for health law was inaccessible,” Douglas said on the program. She cited examples including restroom interiors without sharps disposal for students who use insulin, classroom doors that are “so stiff” they are difficult to open, and what she described as the absence of a formal fire-evacuation plan for students who cannot use stairs.

The program’s host, Lex Frieden, professor of informatics at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and director of the ILRU program at TIRR Memorial Hermann, framed the issue in the context of federal law: “Law school and universities are responsible for meeting the requirements of the ADA,” Frieden said during the show’s closing segment.

Why it matters: The University of Houston…

UH Law Center student says new building has accessibility gaps including evacuation plan and doors

Summary

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