Rides for Disabled May Cost Cities Millions : Civil rights: A federal law guarantees equal access for the handicapped. Several municipalities offer limited or no transit service.

Harry Groce, confined to a wheelchair in Simi Valley since suffering a stroke last year, is one of a relatively few elderly and disabled county residents who can count on door-to-door transit service on the days he needs to visit the doctor.

That’s because of a “dial-a-ride” program, with two wheelchair-equipped vans, begun by the city of Simi Valley almost a decade ago to meet the special transportation needs of the handicapped. “It’s great,” said Groce, 60, who started using the service in September. “A lot of people don’t have something like this.”

County transit officials agree with that assessment. They say that several cities in the county either provide limited transit service for the disabled or none at all.

But that is about to change because of a federal civil rights law passed by Congress last summer that guarantees the handicapped equal access to jobs, public facilities and public transportation.

Ventura County officials say the greatest challenge facing cities in complying with the statute will be providing the disabled with the same level of transit services that is now available to the general public.

They say that accomplishing this will probably cost millions of dollars.

Specific provisions of the new law as it pertains to public transit will be released by the U.S. Department of Transportation on July 26, federal officials said. Transit operators will have until Jan. 24 to submit compliance plans to the Urban Mass Transit Administration.

If transit operators do not comply with the new regulations, they risk losing federal transportation funds and face possible prosecution, federal officials said.

“It’s going to have major impacts . . . because of the financial costs,” Maureen Lopez, director of planning for South Coast Area Transit, said of the new law. SCAT provides bus service for the cities of Ventura, Oxnard, Port Hueneme, Santa Paula and Ojai.

Lopez said it will cost the agency and the cities that it serves an estimated $1.5 million to $2 million annually to operate a dial-a-ride program, something SCAT now does not do. Lopez said it is uncertain where the money is going to come from.

“That’s a great question,” she said. “Unfortunately, when the new law was handed down, there was no additional money provided.”

Lopez said extra money is needed to operate more than a dozen specially equipped vans to transport the disabled throughout SCAT’s 80-square-mile service area. She said the projected operating costs do not include purchasing the vans, which can run as high as $80,000 each.

Lopez said funding for the new service will undoubtedly have to come from the cities or else regular bus service will have to be scaled back to make ends meet. She said this would be a major blow to the county’s efforts to get more people to use public transit to reduce smog.

“It’s tough,” she said, “especially if you look at what we’ve done over the years to expand service and improve it.”

SCAT officials said regular bus ridership has jumped from 1.6 million in 1987 to 2.8 million in 1991, up 75%. The agency now operates 14 bus routes and has plans to expand to 17 beginning next month.

Lopez said that according to preliminary estimates, SCAT would serve about 4,200 elderly and handicapped passengers a day through a dial-a-ride program. She said exactly how many of those will be handicapped passengers is uncertain because the U.S. Census Bureau does not differentiate between the elderly and the handicapped.

Other questions also remain unanswered. For example, Lopez said she did not know if limited transit programs provided for the handicapped in Oxnard, Ventura and Ojai will be considered in meeting the demands of the new law.

A survey of other Ventura County cities found that some type of door-to-door transit service for the handicapped also is available in Fillmore and Thousand Oaks.

Two cities that do not have programs in place are Camarillo and Moorpark.

“We are in the process of working up a dial-a-ride program now,” said Roc Pulido, a city traffic engineer. He said city officials will discuss the issue at a meeting today.

Pulido said the city operates two buses, which are both equipped to accommodate the handicapped.

Susan Cauldwell, assistant to Moorpark’s City Manager Steven Kueny, said the city operates only one bus. She said the city used to provide dial-a-ride assistance as part of its regular bus service, but that it was rarely used. She said the City Council can reinstate the dial-a-ride program if necessary.

Meanwhile, officials in Thousand Oaks and Simi Valley said they will probably have to expand operating hours and purchase new equipment for their dial-a-ride programs to comply with the new law.

Roy Myers, a Thousand Oaks transit official, said the city had recently been planning to expand its dial-a-ride program but was forced to delay its plans because of budget constraints. The city contracts with the Thousand Oaks Cab Co. to provide low-cost, door-to-door service for the elderly and the handicapped.

Myers said the city has agreed to pay the cab company a higher hourly rate so the company can purchase two wheelchair-equipped vans. The company now uses three station wagons that can only accommodate collapsible wheelchairs.

Myers said the subsidized taxi service is provided from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekends. The cost for the service can range from 50 cents to $1.50, depending upon a person’s ability to pay.

Myers said he anticipates that the city will eventually have to expand its operating hours to meet that of its regular bus service, which runs from 6:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. seven days a week.

Myers said there is no need to advertise the service because it already is heavily used. He said monthly ridership averages about 5,000. Total ridership for 1990-91 was 58,000, up from 55,000 in 1989-90 and 48,000 in 1988-89.

Jim Wolfe, deputy director of Simi Valley’s Community Services Department, said his city’s door-to-door transit service cannot accommodate everyone wanting to use it.

“We turn away on the average about 50 to 60 people a month,” he said.

The city operates its two wheelchair-equipped vans from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. Wolfe also said the new law will probably require that the city expand its hours to equal that of regular bus service, which operates from 5:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

He said the city has already put in a request to the City Council for the purchase of a new van to meet provisions of the law.

Wolfe said that although all of the city’s nine municipal buses are wheelchair-equipped, many elderly residents such as Groce prefer the convenience of the dial-a-ride service.

“Door-to-door service is more critical for seniors and the disabled,” he said.

Ray Turpin, the city’s transit director, said total ridership on the dial-a-ride service this year was 13,316, up from 11,474 during the 1989-90 fiscal year and 9,188 in 1988-89.

Turpin said there is a 75-cent donation to ride the bus, but that fee is waived if a person is unable to pay.

Linda Galbraith, a board member of the Independent Living Resource Center in Oxnard, said the new law will make a tremendous difference in the lives of disabled people.

“Many disabled people who live on their own never get out,” said Galbraith, whose state-funded nonprofit agency helps disabled people live independently. “The access just wasn’t there. So they were kept from jobs, schooling and housing.”

Galbraith, who has used a wheelchair since a 1982 car accident, said that for the first five years after her accident she had to use public transit to get around and “it was hell.”

She said that although bus service has improved over the years, door-to-door service is still needed.

“Yes, it will be costly for everybody,” she said, “but at the same time whatever you do for us will help you. A lot of us want to work and give back to the community. Just because I’m in a wheelchair doesn’t mean I’m less of a person than you.”