Malta not following disability laws
The Times of Malta has a story about an agency that is supposed to make sure all buildings are accessible via wheelchair, but new building permits are going around the agency. The number of permits that the agency has vetted dropped by 40% compared to last year, but there has not been a 40% drop in new building construction. No one has tracked down why builders are going around the law, or even how they are doing it. However, it is obvious that the government of Malta, which signed the Convention on Rights for Persons with Disabililties which guarantees all new construction will fully accommodate the disabled. In the mean time there are more and more buildings that people in wheelchairs cannot get into. One woman has started a writing campaign to let her governmental officials know that the law is not being followed. A new cinema down the street from this woman has no ramps in it’s entrance, making it impossible for her to see a movie as able bodied people are.
We have seen situations where building inspectors in cities will "look the other way" when given the correct amount of moiny to forget certain rules. It is expensive to make a building accessible and so it is easier, cheaper, and faster to bribe inspectors and city officials not to enforce laws for the disabled. Once the building has been constructed, it is all but impossible to make the owners come back and make the changes that should have been there to begin with. The disabled are now locked out of the building or restaurant or grocery store and no one seems to care. At least the ADA in the g States can be used to drag building owners into court and force them to make the appropriate changes guaranteed by federal law. But unless a disabled person sues and is willing to go to court over a building problem, nothing is fixed. If cities and counties cannot do the job, maybe we need federal engineers that enforce laws like the ADA and refuse to sign off on construction that do not follow the law?
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