Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Few Attend College’s Handicapped Awareness Day : Disabilities: No one shows up for program’s showcase event. Organizers blame rain, in part.

College of the Canyons students and faculty members Monday were invited to face the everyday challenges that come with a disability.

They declined.

Organizers of the community college’s second annual Handicapped Awareness Day wanted volunteers to go about their daily business for an hour using a wheelchair or a walker or while blindfolded.

No one showed up for the demonstration, which is considered the showcase event of the awareness program.

Rainy weather moved the event indoors and may have dissuaded some, said Joe Cedillo, a student government officer who helped coordinate the program. Thirteen people participated last year.

“Everybody got word of this. Everyone knows it’s going on,” Cedillo said, standing by a pair of empty wheelchairs and unused walkers, waiting for an audience.

About a dozen people attended a talk later in the morning by Santa Clarita businessman Gary Johnson.

Johnson, who runs a computer company and is active in the Santa Clarita Valley Chamber of Commerce, had both of his legs amputated below the knee about 10 years ago.

“Individuals aren’t aware of what we’re going through,” he said in a mostly upbeat speech, which also told of strangers crossing the street to avoid walking past him. “A lot of it is fear--fear of getting involved, fear of touching and catching something. It’s ignorance is what it is.”

Supporters say they’re happy to get their message out, even if only a small audience hears it.

“In terms of success--two people would’ve been a success,” Cedillo said, noting the Handicapped Awareness Day wouldn’t exist if not for student creator Randell Resneder.

Resneder, 20, modeled the event after a program he began at William S. Hart High School in 1988 when he was a student there. No one in College of the Canyons’ student government wanted to take on the project, but Resneder persuaded them after five visits, Cedillo said.

“It’s not that I felt sorry for him. It’s that he’s so motivated and kept coming,” Cedillo said.

Resneder launched the awareness programs after being harassed about the symptoms of his cerebral palsy.

“When students asked me where was my mommy, I knew I had to do something about it,” Resneder said. “If they won’t change for me, maybe they’ll change for Disabled Students (Services and Programs).”

Disabled Students Services and Programs provides assistance to about 170 College of the Canyons students who have some sort of disability. Resneder is transferring to Cal State Northridge next year and hopes Handicapped Awareness Day will continue at the College of the Canyons without him.