ADA Compliance lawsuit closes restuarant. Adios, Fords Burgers.

A 50 year old burger joint in California gets sued by a lawyer over ADA compliance issues.  The owners don't have money to upgrade the entire restaurant so they're shutting down.  The issue that forced the ADA compliance problem was counter tops that were too tall to meet the standard in the 50 year old building the restuarant was located. Sadly, the ADA  (Americans with Disabilities Act) is subject to enormous abuses which diminishes the good it can accomplish.  Unfortunately, when lawyers can initiate lawsuits on their own behalf to provide for the enforcement of the ADA, there is a natural tendency for some (a small minority, really) lawyers to enrich themselves while claiming good intentions.

ADA compliance is also notoriously hard to manage because of the complexity of the regulations and the lack to trained people to help businesses identify and correct issues prior to the lawsuit.

ADA Compliance Surveys

If you have access to an ADA compliance consultant, I urge you to meet with them regularly to protect yourselves.  A good consultant will analyze your building, generate a report and, in many cases, follow up with you and your facilities maintenance personnel to ensure that you are in ADA compliance.

In the State of California, you can locate ADA Compliance inspectors at the CASp website.  CASp stands for Certified Access Specialist, a voluntary certification program.