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Paralyzed councilman asked to climb out of wheelchair onto debate stage

Story by Daniel Wu • Yesterday 2:49 AM

Denver City Council member Chris Hinds had come to a local dance theater on Monday afternoon prepared to debate politics ahead of an upcoming municipal election. Chairs and water bottles were laid out onstage, and an audience of around 100 local voters was watching. There was just one issue.

There was no way for Hinds, who is paralyzed from the chest down and uses a wheelchair, to get onto the raised stage to join the other participants. Staff, puzzled, suggested lifting Hinds and his 400-pound wheelchair onto the stage. That was a no-go.

“So they said, ‘Well, how about you get out of your chair?’” Hinds told The Washington Post.

In an uncomfortable scene captured on video by the debate audience, Hinds hoisted himself out of his wheelchair, pulled his legs up onto the stage and clung to a metal chair leg as the audience murmured and the debate’s organizers discussed how to accommodate him.

“I felt like a circus monkey,” Hinds said.

Hinds called the experience humiliating, and screenshots of him climbing onto the stage and a subsequent story by the Denver Post prompted criticism from politicians and disability advocates on social media. Hinds hopes it brings awareness to the push for disability accommodation that he said he entered local politics to support.

“This should be a teachable moment,” Hinds said. “ … We shouldn’t be asking for accommodations for things that should already have been the law.”

Denver clerk Paul López said in a statement that the debate venue, Cleo Parker Robinson Dance, had been approved to host the debate and said in its application that it met accessibility requirements set forth by the Americans With Disabilities Act. Cleo Parker Robinson Dance issued an apology to Hinds on Wednesday and said that while the dance center’s theater is accessible, the theater’s stage is not.

“No one should have that experience, and I have apologized to Councilman Hinds personally,” López said in his statement. “Our office continues to communicate with all debate sponsors to ensure that they can fulfill ADA requirements and other needs.”

Patricia Smith, a spokesperson for the dance center, said it was working on making the stage accessible.

Hinds became paralyzed in 2008 after suffering a spinal cord injury in an accident while cycling, he said. He became an advocate for disability rights and won recognition from Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) in 2018 when the governor named a bill strengthening parking fee exemptions for people with disabilities after him. He decided to run for local office the same year.

“I feel like I have an obligation,” Hinds said. “If I can represent the disability community, then I should.”

That belief was validated, Hinds said, when he was elected in 2019 and arrived at Denver City Hall — where he discovered neither the city council chambers nor restrooms were wheelchair accessible.

“Even 29 years after ADA was passed, the only reason City Hall became more accessible for people with disabilities is because someone with a disability was elected,” Hinds said.

Hinds was dismayed to encounter the same issue on Monday, he said. He added that Denver elections law furthered his dilemma. Not participating in the debate would have meant forfeiting campaign funds the city matches and multiplies from voter donations ahead of April’s municipal elections. Hinds felt his reelection campaign was at stake as he clambered out of his wheelchair and onto the stage.

“My thought was either I do what they want me to do, or I forfeit my campaign’s viability,” Hinds said.

After trying and failing to lift Hinds’s wheelchair onto the stage separately, the debate organizers decided to move the rest of the debate’s participants off the stage and hold the debate at ground level in front of the first row of theater seats so Hinds could remain in his wheelchair. But after holding up the debate and perching awkwardly onstage in front of an audience of around 100 voters, Hinds said he felt rattled.

Disability advocates slammed the theater’s lack of accommodation after images of Hinds struggling out of his wheelchair circulated online. Hinds said he received “heartwarming” messages of support from as far as Alaska and that the response has helped blunt the humiliation of the viral scene.

Filmmaker Vince Chandler, who attended the debate and took some of the footage later shared on social media, said in a text message to The Post that his reaction was of “abject horror.”

“I couldn’t believe how unprepared a city-organized debate could be for this,” Chandler said.

But Colorado House Rep. David Ortiz (D), who is also paralyzed and uses a wheelchair, said Wednesday on Twitter that it “is UNFORTUNATELY a common occurrence for us that live with a #disability.”

On Thursday, Hinds was preparing for another debate for candidates in his district. He said he was assured that he’d be able to participate fully this time.

“Lots of Ts crossed and Is dotted at this point,” Hinds said, chuckling. “If there’s an issue tonight, I have serious concerns about our democracy.”

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