Wendy Roth; Helped Disabled Get Access to Parks

Wendy Carol Roth, a former Los Angeles television producer who turned her advancing multiple sclerosis into an opportunity to help provide all disabled people with greater access to national parks, has died. She was 48.

Roth died March 14 in Santa Barbara of complications of the disease she had battled for nearly 30 years, said her husband, film and video editor and photographer Michael Tompane.

A onetime hiking enthusiast, Roth refused to let her descent toward quadriplegia keep her from the great outdoors she loved. In 1988, she and Tompane set out on a four-year, 32,000-mile, 41-state odyssey to visit more than 40 national parklands to see how close she could get to the Grand Canyon and other sights in her electric three-wheeled scooter.

Roth camped, went white-water rafting at Big Bend National Park in Texas, rode motorboats at Everglades National Park in Florida, sailed Acadia National Park in Maine and explored pueblos in Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico.

The arduous trip--by the end Roth was maneuvering her special wheelchair with her chin--resulted in the couple’s book, “Easy Access to National Parks,” published by Sierra Club Books in 1992. Roth and Tompane also created a companion 30-minute video, “Easy Access to National Parks,” presenting a visual tour of nine major parks, including Yosemite and Yellowstone.

They became strong advocates of greater access to parks for people with physical challenges. Roth and Tompane established Easy Access Parks Challenge, organizing volunteers and raising money to work with the National Park Foundation on projects that improved accessibility at 175 places in more than 100 national parks.

Among those improvement projects, for example, was the placement of television screens at the base of Alcatraz in San Francisco Bay so that visitors could view the cellblock without making a tough quarter-mile climb to the building.

The National Multiple Sclerosis Society gave Roth its National Education Award in 1988 and last year she received its prestigious National Achievement Award.

“If you lose mobility, you can still climb mountains or view the lakes,” she said in accepting the 2000 honor. “If you lose use of your hands, you can still fix things. If you cannot see or hear, your family and friends are still with you. Finally, for anyone with challenges in life, MS or not, challenge back! . . . If you do not give up, you will take your soul to the place you want to be.”

Access to parks was only one part of Roth’s advocacy for the handicapped. She wrote several articles for national publications, and, with such titles as “Let Us Work,” was instrumental in gaining passage of the Social Security Administration Rehabilitation Act of 1989.

Roth coached actress Lesley Ann Warren on the behavior and possibilities still open to sufferers of multiple sclerosis for Warren’s role in the 1992 CBS movie “In Sickness and in Health.”

During the early progression of her MS, Roth remained in television production, particularly as senior producer for Phil Donahue from 1978 to 1986. In 1986, she developed, wrote and produced Donahue’s five-part series “The Human Animal” for NBC, earning a national Emmy nomination.

Born in Brooklyn, Roth earned a bachelor’s degree at Princeton and master’s at Stanford. She worked for television stations in Washington, D.C., and Chicago before moving to Los Angeles.

In addition to her husband, Roth is survived by her mother, Phyllis Feigenbaum of East Norwich, N.Y., and her brother Richard Roth of Seattle.

The family has asked that any memorial donations be made to the Channel Islands Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, 14 West Valerio, Santa Barbara, CA 93101, or to the Stanley van den Noort Endowed Research Fund, 100 Irvine Hall, UC Irvine, Irvine, CA 92717.