Looking for people who can help a new wheelchair user get back out there

March 17, 2022 9:54 PM

My father-in-law is transitioning to a wheelchair. He's getting more comfortable with the actual wheelchair and is doing well when he's in his Manhattan apartment. Unfortunately, he is struggling with extra planning associated with going out while in a wheel-chair. We looking for a reputable organization/person in NYC that he can hire to call restaurants, museums, and other places on his behalf. A little help would make it a lot easier for him to navigate this often wheelchair-unfriendly city?

Originally, our plan was for the family to do the extra planning until my father-in-law gets comfortable making these calls himself. This was a big no-go. He wasn't comfortable with us helping him. Thankfully, he is now open to hiring someone to give that same help. Great! But how do I find folks who do this sort of thing? Ideally, I would love to find someone local to NYC. I know that even one face-to-face meeting would be great for building trust.

posted by eisenkr to Health & Fitness (10 answers total)

Just to be clear, is he calling to see if the places are wheelchair accessible or to ask for accommodation? A little bit of a different take, but some credit cards have free concierge services, and they could probably do both.
posted by Toddles at 10:40 PM on March 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

Best answer: There is a national network of Independent Living Centers that support people with disabilities. Here is the listing of all of the ILCs in New York state. I don't think they offer this service but they might be able to put you in touch someone, possibly even someone is already a wheelchair user, that might be interested in earning a little extra money helping out your father.
posted by metahawk at 11:34 PM on March 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Replying to Toddles: it’s more than just finding out if a place is wheelchair accessible — it’s what that means. Take restaurants for example. Some places have you enter through a kitchen, some require you to wait for them to bring out a ramp, others have tables too close together to actually navigate to a seat. More confident wheelchair users might be okay with all of these accommodations, but he might want to avoid some of these “accessible” spaces because he struggles with the idea of being a burden on others/the extra attention.
posted by eisenkr at 12:02 AM on March 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Post here on Jobs?
posted by bookmammal at 5:14 AM on March 18, 2022

This seems like a tough job to advertise for not because the work would be difficult but because it seems like it would require a few minutes a week at most. Would your FIL call someone when he wanted to go out and ask them to make the call at that moment? What if they weren't available when he wanted to go out? But most New Yorkers don't really go to new-to-them restaurants and museums all that often even though we like knowing we could. Could you hire someone (maybe a student with a disability?) to call a bunch of restaurants in advance (or even go suss out their lay of the land in person -- I would guess that a lot of these phone calls aren't going to give terribly accurate information other than whether or not they are accessible if you call during a busy shift and ask about the real quality of things, like how close together are the tables). Same with smaller museums etc (I would think the major ones are all accessible in a meaningful way.) Meanwhile look for reviews and websites and blogs to direct him to, like this NYT review and this site.
posted by Tim Bucktooth at 5:59 AM on March 18, 2022

I think that this could fall under the broad category of things one might hire a personal assistant to do, so I might search for services using that terminology. As Tim Bucktooth mentioned, given that these services would take a pretty limited amount of time, so you may have to may for a minimum number of hours that's higher than what you use - but perhaps there are other personal assistant services he could use as well?
posted by mosst at 6:05 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

Best answer: I was a grad student in Manhattan, and I would have loved the opportunity to make a little extra cash by being nice and making a few phone calls. I don't know anyone still in school there, but I wonder if connections to university listservs would be fruitful. Bulletin boards at student centers might work as well too.

I wonder if he would consider a structure like, "I will pay a flat X with an expectation of up to Y hours of work, and an extra Z/hour over that."
posted by quadrilaterals at 7:02 AM on March 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Best answer: ... he might want to avoid some of these “accessible” spaces because he struggles with the idea of being a burden on others/the extra attention.

That sounds to me as though he wishes he could leverage the experience of other restaurant-goers who use a chair. Does Wheelchair Jimmy's sub-site for NYC seem useful?

Is this phone app helpful?

Are there review sites that focus on accessibility? It looks like the WaPo's restaurant reviewer announced a move to start doing this in 2019.
posted by wenestvedt at 8:47 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

He may qualify for some time with a social worker or other healthcare provider since he is now disabled. Call the hospital he uses and ask if they have a program. I will also caution that calling a restaurant or other local to find out accessibility is often fruitless. It’s quite common to be assured of accessibility and then arrive somewhere with steps or narrow doorways. Unfortunately, the only real way to know is to either go or get knowledge from someone else who uses a chair who has been. If he doesn’t have friends who also use wheelchairs, I would strongly encourage him to make some.
posted by Bottlecap at 9:21 AM on March 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

Best answer: In terms of looking for someone to hire, he might want to reach out to the disability services office at local universities (who could then pass along the details to the relevant students). Presumably someone with a mobility disability is more likely to know the right questions to ask (or maybe even have direct experience with the venue).
posted by oceano at 11:59 AM on March 18, 2022