Life, liberty, and the pursuit of health

I never expected to have to write these words in 2014 in the United States of America: I have filed a complaint with the federal Department of Justice against The Valley Athletic Club in Olympia for non-compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Swimming in Lake Chelan, WA

The issue is that the 11,000-member club does not provide access to the club's two swimming pools for people who cannot stand or walk. I am not in this category, by the way, but as someone fighting multiple sclerosis,  I hold access issues near and dear to my heart.

Being able to get into a swimming pool may seem frivolous, unless it is the only form of exercise a person can do. That is the case for hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Americans with physical disabilities.

The  Valley—a behemoth of a club boasting expensive, state-of-the-art exercise equipment in several workout rooms, as well as an indoor and outdoor pool, an in-house spa, a deli, and a childcare facility—claims that installing a poolside chairlift would be prohibitively expensive.

The club does provide an unwieldy set of portable stairs for those, like me, who can navigate them. But if you can't, forget about swimming.

And even if you can, forget about swimming laps during the club's prime times, as the club recently instituted a policy that the stairs would only be installed for so-called "therapy swim" during non-peak times. The stairs take up a good ten or so feet of a swimming lane, but they can be removed as soon as a swimmer is in the water.

Why do I feel as if I am being shunted into the dark corners of the club?

It might be just coincidence, but the club instituted the no-stairs-during-peak-times after I contacted the facility's two managers to request the club purchase a poolside lift system, as many other pools have. The managers told me that the club's 1970s-era pools would require extensive—and expensive--work for such a lift to be installed. In other words, no can do.

 This in a day and age when the United States has a law called the Americans with Disabilities Act, written to protect all citizens against discrimination due to disability:

"The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) prohibits discrimination and ensures equal opportunity for persons with disabilities in employment, state and local government services, public accommodations, commercial facilities [my emphasis], and transportation."

A 2010 revision to the law even addresses pool accommodations. Specifically, the law requires pools to provide a lift  when it is "easily accomplishable without much difficulty or expense." Obviously, those words are open to interpretation, but again, consider that we are talking about an 11,000-member, facility. The IRS even allows a tax deduction for such expenses.

The law also addresses the issue of a facility such as The Valley segregating lap swimmers with disabilities into separate swim times. The 2010 revisions require that pool lifts remain in place "during all times the pool is open to the public…

“Allowing [facilities] to store lifts and only take them out on request places unnecessary additional burdens on people with disabilities."

By implication, that would certainly seem to include leaving portable stairs in place, especially when there is no lift available.

Why not just join another club, you might ask. I canceled my membership at The Valley first thing the next morning after the club refused to bring out the portable stairs when I requested them; I am looking for another health facility.

That said, The Valley is far and away the best athletic club in the region, and it is reasonably priced. Furthermore, suggesting I join another facility is beside the point. Why should I or any other lap swimmers with disabilities have to?

Why not just use the pool during the so-called therapy swim times? One, the therapy swims (a term which frankly sounds demeaning to this former high school competitive swimmer) are scheduled when my husband is unavailable to help me. And, again, this is beside the point; other swimmers can use the pools whenever the club is open.

Why should a private business be forced to spend money to help just a handful of individuals? It’s unfair and unreasonable to expect a business to shell out money for a service that will benefit only a very few.

First, I suspect more than a few would benefit. But, again, that is beside the point. The club is flaunting the law, plain and simple.

Are we not all our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers? Think about that the next time you go to work out; then imagine a big door being slammed shut in your face.

Update: Three days after this incident, the health club has gone back to bringing the portable steps out on request at any time, not just during "therapy swims." The management and owner are looking into what it would take to install a chairlift. In other words, we're back where we started. I told one of the managers that if and when they get the chairlift, please let me know so that if the Department of Justice does contact me, I can tell them the issue has been resolved. I have to believe there is a way for a club with the resources of this one to do this.