Jean Ryan Testimony: Disabled in Action of Metropolitan NY

We are in favor of outdoor dining, and we do not want to go back to the year-round sheds which were mostly inaccessible to people with disabilities.

And for the record, the first time I heard anybody today talking about accessibility were from these two people at the table.

Nobody here mentioned it.

No council member and no restaurant person, and no DOT person.

Some of us enjoy outdoor dining and like to eat out with our friends and families, but if an outdoor restaurant is not accessible to people with disabilities because it has a step up or down, like what typically happened in the emergency ones, or has a steep ramp or the tables are too close together, restaurants do not get our business.

This is 2025, 35 years after the ADA was enacted.

You'd think the restaurant executives would want accessibility because it's good for business.

In the 2020 version of sheds, no amount of complaints by us, even by the mayor's office for people with disabilities, MOBED, made any difference.

We definitely do not want to go back to those bad old days.

And that was when the other agency was in charge, and they did nothing about accessibility.

So people are saying you want to go back to that agency, and they did nothing.

You know, that doesn't make any sense to us.

I spent much time with architects working on what eventually became the new prototypes for restaurants.

We are in favor of the new prototypes, but we are extremely concerned about the one prototype that allows for a ramp, because if there is no ramp available, then that outdoor restaurant is totally inaccessible to us.

I voiced this concern during the early discussions, but DOT wanted to help more restaurants be able to be outdoors if the landscape was not level enough.

I need more time, I can't read well.

It might be hip to have high stools and chairs and high tables, but they are inaccessible.

Then we can't even go to that place.

As the years went on, many sheds were eyesores, and people are not really talking about that today.

And many were not the economic engine that they were purported to be because of lack of staffed wait on tables outside and inside, and the sheds smelled like rotten food that was rat fodder.

They were not hygienic.

Many sheds were abandoned or used for storage.

I saw Christmas trees and construction materials in the sheds, as well as stack tables and chairs.

Streets are for everyone, not just for restaurants to have a structure on them year in and year out.

And nothing, some were nice, but most were shabby and unkempt, and we're not paid painted or kept up.

So we have to give everyone the same amount of time.

I'm gonna ask if you could please wrap up and then you can submit the testimony.

Yes, so I just say that we want accessibility, and that has to be a priority.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm gonna call the next panel.

Kathleen Irwin, Sarah Lynd, Cecil Brooks Jr., if you could please come down, thank you.

Yes, I see you are immediately revision.

What?

Yeah.

Hello, good afternoon.

My name is Kathleen Irwin with the New York State Restaurant Association.

Um, thank you for holding this hearing today and giving us the opportunity to discuss the rollout of Dining Out NYC.