Aimee Levesque is an incredible parent/disability advocate who stumbled upon the Access Nashville program about a year ago. She called me and said we need to meet on this. 8-9 meetings later we are about to embark on the Buffalo version of this Vanderbilt University creation.

Access Buffalo is a project whereby trained college students do accessibility reviews of local restaurants. They are then rated in three categories; Excellent/Wow, Good, or Limited. The approach is designed to be comfortable and informative. The Principal investigators then review the survey results and apply the grade. We will also be training restaurant owners on Disability Awareness through their regional association. Its staying power comes from the relationship with the Buffalo Niagara Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Access Buffalo link whereby all surveyed restaurants will be available to the general and visiting public. We have an advisory council that is representative of the community across disability spectrums and professionals.

Access Buffalo will train its first class on March 23 at Canisius College. We are excited about this move and support throughout the community is vast. The Western New York Independent Living Center is housing the project. Our website should be up soon.

This is part of the continuing effort of Disability Awareness Training to address inclusion issues in WNY and beyond. It's been a busy time as we are now working on a grant for AT&T serving the state of California's Public Utility Commission. This will address awareness and responsive relative to call centers. This is coupled with my last blog and the Town Hall training being developed.