1997-037-RES WHEREAS, TEXAS DEPT OF HOUSING AND COMMUNITY AFFAIRS PROVIDES FUNDING

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410:4 When Ualtemate routes" are permissible Queslions have arisen as to whether programs are "accessible" if persons in wheelchairs are required to use routes to and from programs that are not as direct as those used by non-mobility- impaired persons (e.g" freight elevators, side doors, having to leave a facility and re-enter in order to go from one floor to another). Although the Department of Education (ED) has not formally addressed this queslion, informal discussion with' ED staff indicates that alternate routes will be acceptable under certain circumstances, To preserve the "mosl integrated setting appropriale," principle when alternate roules are necessary, all persons, not merely those with mobility impairments, should be permitted to use the alternate routes. These alternate roules should be made into "regular pedestrian passages," and upgraded, if necessary, with the lighting, maintenance and allention accorded primary entrances and exits, Recipients are strongly encouraged to avoid practices that would require mobility-impaired persons to lelephone ahead 10 gain entrance into a facility or ring a bell and wait for access. Such practices are not being viewed positively by federal officials, since they have resulted in considerable inconvenience and limited accessibilily in the past. Alternate routes that are not as direct as those used by nonhandicapped persons, such as those that would require a person to exit a building and re-enter on a different level to go from one floor to another, will evidently be permissible so long as gross violalions of the "most integrated setting appropriate" principle would not result. For instance, it would not be acceptable to maintain an athletic facility that required a mobility-impaired person to go outdoors in the process of going from a weight room to a locker/shower room, In cases where the use of the alternate roules poses either safety or security problems, recipients must, on a case-by-case basis, weigh factors such as (1) size of facility, (2) facility use(s), (3) the degree of traffic that the alternate route is likely to produce, (4) the nature and degree of the risks involved, and (5) the cost of making primary routes accessible. Accessibility of secondary facilities: rest rooms, water fountains, telephones When existing facilities require renovation to achieve program accessibility, the primary emphasis should be on the program or activity itself, and making certain that handicapped persons may participale fully in the program or activity. However, there are secondary considerations related to facilities such as rest rooms, water fountains and telephones, since each may require use by a participant in the accessible program or activity. But there are no clear-cut standards in this regard. HEW has suggested that questions of which adjacent rest rooms, waler fountains and telephones need to be accessible depend on considerations such as the distance 10 the nearest such accessible facility and the number of participants in the accessible program or activity. If, for . example, a lecture hall is used by several hundred persons at a time, accessibility should be achieved in secondary facilities also. However, if a small section of a history course is made Federal Programs Advisory Service November 1984 Handicapped Requirements Handbook