Bureaucracy Handicapped by Case of Rigidity

People cheered this year when 19 UCLA footballers got nailed for fraudulently securing handicapped parking placards. Hooray for a system that, in that instance, worked.

Then there’s Leslie Robison’s story.

She’s not a football player. She’s a 38-year-old social worker from Laguna Beach who at 26 was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She has a wheelchair but uses it only if she otherwise would have to be on her feet for awhile, such as at the mall. She limps and frequently uses a cane. The wobble in her right leg is obvious, but aside from that, she doesn’t show any outward symptoms of the disease.

For the last nine years, she’s had a handicapped parking placard, renewable each year. She takes it for granted like the rest of us do our wallets.

In short, Robison is the kind of person the system protects from the likes of football players and other frauds.

Or so she thought.

The first time I talked to her was in August, shortly after she’d gotten a ticket in Santa Ana for displaying an expired handicapped placard. Robison assumed that once she explained in a written appeal that she had MS, the ticket would be torn up.

Ah, but our beloved bureaucracy doesn’t work like that.

‘I Was Crushed’

On the day she phoned me, she was distraught. Despite filling in the form saying she had MS and now had a current placard, the reviewer denied her appeal, writing only: “A valid placard must be displayed as required.”

She could appeal further, the form said, in person or by sending in a written declaration. Having already gotten nowhere in one written declaration that she had MS, Robison decided to appeal in person.

“I was crushed,” she says. “I have this disease. OK, I live with it. It’s not fun, but now it was like adding insult to injury.”

That was her mood when we talked in August.

Heartless beast that I am, I told Robison to give the system more time. They hear a million excuses. Wait until after your personal appearance, I said. Surely, any hearing officer then would expunge the ticket.

That hearing occurred Sept. 21. With aid of her cane, Robison walked into a room that included only her and the hearing officer, whose name she doesn’t recall.

Although she says she wasn’t told to bring any documentation with her, her failure to do so short-circuited the meeting, she says. Even though the officer could have verified her disability merely by observing her walk around the room, he instead set the matter over for a later date.

Two weeks later, Robison is still waiting to hear what that date will be.

Losing Sight of Bottom Line

I hear some of your voices now: It’s Robison’s fault her placard expired. Whatever she gets, she brought on herself.

Yes, it was her responsibility. She deserved the original ticket.

But what’s the point of having an appeal process if someone claiming to have MS is turned down? If an expired placard trumps all excuses, why bother appealing?

The short answer is that people can make up all kinds of excuses to get out of a ticket, including, I suppose, faking multiple sclerosis.

So stipulated. But after someone shows up with a wobbly leg and a cane and a valid placard, what’s the reason for not expunging the ticket on the spot?

Here’s the bottom line: the law is to keep able-bodied people from using the parking spots. Once a person, like Robison, proves their disability, he or she shouldn’t be penalized for a procedural error. No harm, no foul.

What am I missing?

“I feel like their diligence in cracking down on frauds is to protect the rights of people like me,” Robison says. “When that diligence gets twisted to crack down on people like me, that’s when I get outraged and appalled it could happen.”

The city of Santa Ana has cashed her $275 check. That galls Robison, but I tell her she’ll still probably prevail.

I’m not sure she believes me.

“I so legitimately need that placard,” she says. “I walk horribly. That’s how I went into this whole situation, thinking, of course, they’ll write the ticket off. Of course they will.”

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Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by calling (714) 966-7821 or by writing to him at the Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or by e-mail to dana.parsons@latimes.com