Saturday, January 10, 2004

By Jan Ackerman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The Port Authority said a bus driver who failed to pick up a wheelchair-using man in Garfield when the 86B Frankstown bus's lift malfunctioned will get remedial training in the use of handicapped equipment.

The incident led to the arrest of Donald Stancile, who blocked the bus with his wheelchair on Wednesday after he was not able to board it.

"The driver is being retrained on the operation of the bus," Port Authority spokeswoman Judi McNeil said yesterday.

	PREVIOUS ARTICLEMan blocks bus, is jailed

The driver, Lydia Walker, a six-year veteran, did not manually lower the ramp to pick up Stancile, 53, of Homewood, at a bus stop at Penn and Atlantic avenues at about 8 p.m. The ramp can be operated manually if it fails mechanically. Instead, Walker called for another bus to pick up Stancile.

Stancile, new president of ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, responded by rolling his wheelchair in front of the 86B bus.

City police who responded arrested Stancile, charging him with obstruction of traffic and disorderly conduct. Stancile previously had staged protests against the Port Authority, but had not been arrested.

McNeil said Stancile refused to board a second bus that was diverted to Penn Avenue and arrived five minutes after the incident began, but continued to block Walker's bus while wearing a protest sign. Stancile contended that the second bus didn't arrive for about a half-hour.

McNeil said the Port Authority takes treatment of the handicapped seriously and requires its drivers to undergo extensive training to meet Americans with Disabilities Act requirements. In 2003, she said, the authority logged an average of two complaints per million rides for problems related to service to handicapped riders.

McNeil said she was not permitted to say whether the bus driver was disciplined for the incident involving Stancile.

E-mail this story   Print this story