Activist Turns Disabilities Into Opportunities

For Douglas Martin, the introduction of the Salk vaccine came one year too late.

Stricken with polio in 1952 at the age of 5, he spent his next three years in an iron lung at a hospital in Omaha, Neb. The disease left him quadriplegic, permanently weakened in the lungs and subject to frequent bouts of pneumonia.

Today, Martin is leading the fight to expand opportunities for the disabled. Now 42, Martin is special assistant to the chancellor at UCLA, where he directs the university’s efforts to eliminate discrimination against the disabled.

On Friday night, the disability rights activist will receive a national Distinguished Service Award from President Bush’s Committee for Employment of People with Disabilities. The award will be presented at a black-tie gala at Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel.

It has been a long journey for the native of Naper, Neb., who as a young man won a scholarship to the University of Nebraska but was then denied admission because university officials thought it would be impossible to accommodate his disability.

“I am very honored,” Martin said of the award, which, according to the White House announcement, is presented for “extraordinary meritorious service” that advances opportunities for people with disabilities.

Specifically, the award recognizes 15 years of work by Martin to bring about changes in Social Security programs so they help people with disabilities to work and be independent.

“It is essential that persons with disabilities become involved in policy-making decisions which effect their lives,” Martin said. “This award encourages me in my convictions to get involved.”

In addition to his work at UCLA and his lobbying efforts, Martin has served as disability services coordinator for Culver City and was a co-founder of the Westside Center for Independent Living.

Last year, he successfully lobbied Congress for a change in Medicare laws that allows disabled people who re-enter the work force to retain their benefits. Beginning in July, Medicare will cover disabled people regardless of their ability to work.

But his most gratifying achievement, he says, was his decade-long effort that led to the signing of the Employment Opportunities for Disabled Americans Act into public law.

Signed into law in 1986, the act substantially revises Social Security laws and Supplemental Security Income regulations in an effort to create a system that encourages the disabled to enter or remain in the work force and eliminates rules that penalize them for doing so.

“It was the longest sustained advocacy that I had done,” said Martin.

Martin began his advocacy for the changes in 1977, spurred in part by his own experience with a Social Security regulation that denied all benefits to disabled people who earned more than $300 a month.

“I had been looking for a job for many years after I left school,” Martin recalled. “But I could not accept employment because I could not afford to lose some of the benefits.”

Those who have dealt with Martin offer high praise.

“When I first met him, he was the advocate,” said Kay Van Horn, a field representative for Rep. Anthony Beilenson (D-Los Angeles). “But when he left the office, I forgot that he was disabled. He was so inspiring, bright and caring.”

Martin, who lives in West Los Angeles, points to his wheelchair as he asserts that his personal experiences have always inspired him to prod administrators to make more visible changes in institutions. At UCLA, Martin’s job is to ensure compliance with the 1973 Rehabilitation Act, which prohibits any recipient of federal aid from discriminating against disabled people.

“The rejection by the University of Nebraska (because of his disability) haunted me all my adult life,” he said. “They saw the visible disability but could not anticipate my motivation and dedication.”

Martin attended UCLA, where “the climate was milder, the barriers were fewer, and the environment was very accommodating.” He earned his bachelor’s, master’s and Ph.D. in urban studies. He was named a departmental scholar and in 1972 became the first disabled person to be named a UCLA Chancellor’s Fellow.

It was toward the end of his doctoral program that Martin visited the Center for Independent Living, an organization set up mainly by disabled students at UC Berkeley. The center provided services, such as advocacy, housing and personal attendants to the disabled.

After receiving his doctorate, Martin teamed up with UCLA students and community members to establish the Westside Center for Independent Living in 1976. “It was more a labor of love and a deep personal conviction for change than anything else,” he said.

Today, the center on Venice Boulevard in Mar Vista, is one of the nation’s largest nonprofit centers providing services to the disabled that are aimed at helping them function independently in society.

“He has blazed the trail for everybody else. His ability to focus on the pivotal issue makes him very valuable,” said Susan (Tink) Miller, an interim co-director at the Westside center. Miller, who first met Martin in 1979 after she moved from Florida, said Martin’s “commitment to change is his purpose in life.”

Despite the achievements, Martin says there are still miles to go. “It is assumed that unless there is a very large number of people involved, it is not feasible to make changes. That is a circular argument. Disabled people don’t ride the bus because they can’t use the bus.”

Martin said there has to be a major shift in the paternalistic attitude of society toward the disabled. “We have to move from a charity and a sympathy model to a minority model that grants us civil rights and equal privileges,” he said.

Martin is now working to scale that next wall: the Americans with Disabilities Act that would grant full civil rights and non-discrimination guarantees to the disabled whether or not they receive federal aid. The Senate approved a version of the bill last fall, and the House is expected to vote on its version next month.

“I am optimistic,” he said. “It is an idea whose time has come.”

Though Martin’s work frequently takes him to Sacramento and Washington, his disability makes travel difficult. Weakened by post-polio effects, including low stamina and respiratory dependency that makes him use a portable iron lung every night, Martin says he hopes that “if I take all the precautions, I can continue to be active for a long time.”