DARA: Delivering Access Rights for All
In June 2002 Kildare County Council and the four town councils adopted the Barcelona Declaration. The Barcelona Declaration is a manifesto which came from a European Congress dedicated to the disabled and their living environment. The Manifesto was adopted in March 1995 in Barcelona and since then has been adopted by many cities and towns throughout Europe. This means that the council has declared its intent to carry out their business according to the principles of the Barcelona Declaration.
The principles are:
- Promotion of disability awareness
- Adoption of policies and measures to develop disability – proof decision-making processes.
- Development of a consultation process for disability proofing
- Achievement of inclusion and accessibility by providing access to social and physical environments as well as services to people with disability
- Development of policies that will adapt the environment to the needs of people with disability.
- Provision of training
In September 2004 the Community & Enterprise Department established a multi-sectoral team whose aim is to develop an action plan to progress Kildare County Council commitments under the Barcelona Declaration.
The multi – sectoral team provides a mechanism whereby Councillors and council staff can discuss council services with disabled people, disability advocates and representatives of the Community and Voluntary Sector. Together we can devise better ways of providing resources and services for people with disabilities.
In order to ensure that this action plan is as inclusive as possible our work over the last 6 months has included the setting up of a disability consultation group, consultation with staff and disability awareness training with members of management team. The 3 year plan is now near completion.
The Barcelona Project team have adopted a name for its implementation of the Barcelona Project. The project will be now called the DARA Project, which means Delivering Access Rights for All.
Reasonable Accommodation Initiative – Improving accessibility of services.
In April 2005 the Equality Authority invited Kildare local authorities to take part in the Reasonable Accommodation Initiative. In 2004 Kildare Library Services took part in a pilot initiative with the Equality Authority called “Access for All”. The success of this venture has encouraged Kildare Local Authorities to show leadership among the local authorities through becoming involved in a joint initiative with Cavan County Council and the Equality Authority.
Through this initiative Kildare Local Authorities have the opportunity to become the first local authorities to ensure that all their services and dealings with the public are truly disability friendly under the terms of the Equal Status Act, 2000-2004.
This initiative was a short term one, which resulted in the completion of a small number of projects, which will improve access to our services for people with disabilities. The initiative started with a Disability Awareness Training day with the Manager, Management Team and key staff. From this training, a number of projects were suggested in each directorate. A total of 11 projects were identified. These projects and any other suggested projects will be included in the Barcelona Declaration action plan (DARA Plan).
The work of the DARA team to date has been:
- Disability Consultation day where members of the public who have a disability were invited to meet members of staff from the different departments. They had the opportunity to discuss how we could improve the accessibility of our services.
- A submission was sent to the Department of Environment regarding the review of the Part M Building regulations. This submission was the result of a workshop held with planners, architects, building control staff and also members of disability groups in Kildare.
- Kildare County Council has also applied for the Excellence through Accessibility award which is run by the National Disability Authority and the Department of Justice, Equality and Law and Reform.
- Disability Awareness Training courses are also been run regularly for staff.
If anyone would like further information please contact:
Ann Marie Conneely at aconneely@kildarecoco.ie or 045 980531
