CDCAN REPORT #139-2010: Governor signs "Ed Roberts Day" bill

SACRAMENTO, CALIF (CDCAN) [Updated 07/19/2010  5:12 PM  (Pacific Time)] –  Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed today SB 1256 by Sen. Loni Hancock (Democrat – Berkeley, 9th State Senate District),  a bill that will require California governors to proclaim each January 23rd as a day of “special significance” honoring the life and work of revered disability rights leader Ed Roberts [pictured left] , recognized across the world as the “father of the independent living” movement for people with disabilities and special needs.  The approval of the legislation comes just a few days before the 20th anniversary of the signing of the landmark Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), which Congress passed and then President George H. W. Bush signed into law on July 26, 1990.

The Ed Roberts Day bill was approved earlier by the Legislature with no opposition votes and support from both parties, passing the Assembly on June 28th by a vote of 73 to 0, and clearing the State Senate in its final vote on July 1st by a vote of 34 to 0 before it was sent to the Governor. 

Governor Signs Legislation Establishing “Ronald Reagan Day”

The Governor also signed legislation, SB 944 by Sen. George Runner (Republican – Antelope Valley) that honors President Ronald Reagan, establishing – like the Roberts Day, a “Ronald Reagan Day” of special significance every February 6th.  Reagan served two full terms as California Governor from 1967 to 1975.

January 23rd Would Be “Ed Roberts” Day

SB 1256 will require that the governor proclaim January 23 of each year as “Ed Roberts Day”, and designate that date as having “special significance” in public schools and educational institutions, and would encourage those entities to conduct suitable commemorative exercises on that date, remembering his life, recognizing his accomplishments as well as the accomplishments of other Californians with disabilities.  Like other state “Day of Significance”, the day would not be a state holiday for state employees.

Roberts who passed away on March 14, 1995 at age 56, was the first person with a disability to serve as director of the California Department of Rehabilitation, appointed by then Governor Jerry Brown.  He was a co-founder of a respected disability advocacy organization in the bay area, the World Institute on Disability (WID) along with Judy Heumann and Joan Leon.

Background of Ed Roberts

The following is included in the text of SB 1256 as background on the life and work of Ed Roberts:

Edward Verne Roberts was born January 23, 1939.

• Ed contracted polio as an adolescent in 1953. For the first year of his illness, he spent nearly all of his time in a hospital. Eventually he left the hospital, but had to spend vast expanses of time in an iron lung.
• His career as an advocate began when a high school administrator threatened to deny him a diploma because he had not completed driver's education and physical education.
• After attending the College of San Mateo, in 1962 he was admitted to the University of California at Berkeley where he became the first severely disabled student to attend UC Berkeley.
• When his search for housing at the university met resistance, in part because of the iron lung that he slept in at night, the director of the campus hospital offered him a room in an empty wing. Ed accepted on the condition that it be treated as dormitory space.
• Other significantly disabled students joined him there over the next few years. They began calling themselves the "Rolling Quads."
• In 1968 when two were threatened with a loss of services by a rehabilitation counselor, the "Rolling Quads" organized a successful protest that led to the counselor's transfer. Their success on campus inspired the group to advocate for curb cuts, opening access to the wider community, and creating the first student-led disability services program at a university in the nation
• The student program in turn led to the creation, in Berkeley, of the nation's first center for independent living. Roberts assumed leadership of the Center for Independent Living, Berkeley, and guided its development as a model for disability advocacy and self-help services across the nation and around the world.
• Ed Roberts earned a B.A. in 1964 and an M.A. in 1966, both from UC Berkeley, in Political Science. He also taught political science at the university for six years.
• In 1975, Governor Jerry Brown appointed Ed Roberts Director of the Department of Rehabilitation. He served in that post until 1983 when he co-founded the World Institute on Disability.
• Ed Roberts died from natural causes on March 14, 1995.

Ed Roberts Campus In Berkeley Also Remembers His Life and Work

Roberts is also being honored in Berkeley with the construction of a new community center, called the Ed Roberts Campus  whose mission is to “ensure that people with disabilities can live independently and without discrimination.”  The Ed Roberts Campus will commemorate the life and work of Roberts. For more information about the Ed Roberts Campus go to their website at:  http://www.edrobertscampus.org/index.html