[Ansteorra] SCA, the ADA, and all of us
Chiara Francesca
chiara.francesca at gmail.com
Sun Mar 25 08:05:30 PDT 2007
Greetings Ld Adm Robert Haddock
You say that you know there are sites in North Texas that are ADA compliant.
Have you ever actually driven out, walked the site, and met with the owners
of the sites?
Have you priced out all these sites?
Have you actually combed through the site to confirm they are ADA compliant?
We just spent the last 6 months updating our site search spreadsheet for
Steppes Warlord. Our Business and populace meetings have been very
passionate of late when discussing the issue of moving much less any other
issue.
We found promising camping sites. For us running Steppes Warlord that means
that out of 20 sites the promising sites allowed Equestrian, Archery, light
fighting, heavy figthing, and camping for a minimum of 500. Those are the
basics you look for first.
But the reality of it is, this is what we found for a majority of them
before we even look at minimum ADA compliance:
1) They are all rented a year or more in advance.
2) They start at 3000.00 for a day (most groups budget a _maximum_ of
1500.00 for the whole weekend just for a site with a hall, not including the
per head charge, porta pots, security guards, etc.)
3) They do not allow Equestrian.
4) If they allow Equestrian they do not allow Archery, and vice versa.
5) They have a 10pm curfew and lock their gate.
6) They ban alcohol. Unless you want to hire an off duty police officer, 1
per 50 or so participants, depending on the site owner you may be able to
have 1 for every 100 participants.
7) They do not allow pets.
8) Some do not allow tenting, you must stay in their cabins so they site can
comply with their federal grant funding.
9) No outside food can be brought in, you must pay for their catering
service.
I could go on, and have but frankly I loath long emails and know that many
of us do not read past the first paragraph of any email.
My Point.
We have looked for ADA compliant sites to the degree of what you are wanting
(there are different levels). By we I mean Event Stewards, Seneschals,
Barons, and do not forget our Baroness'. To book most (not all but about 90%
of them) ADA compliant sites means that we have them for one day, no
camping, no alcohol, no fighting, no equestrian, no archery, no feast, and
believe it or not, no animals of any kind no matter what their purpose is.
ADA is not what you think it is.
Please take care who you chastise and why. Do personal research, be the
leader you expect to see out of the rest of us, email event stewards, email
all the others you list before you set off on a quest to fight a windmill
that has already been conquored and is actually a hand held fan that is very
easy to work with.
Chiara Francesca
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