Q&A with Richard Pimentel, disability rights pioneer who started advocacy journey at PSU

Richard Pimentel, a key player in the fight for rights for people with disabilities, began his advocacy work in the 1970s when he was a student at Portland State.  

As part of a class project at PSU, Pimentel trained supervisors at US Bank and Tektronix on disabilities issues, which significantly increased the number of people with disabilities hired by these firms. Following this success, Pimentel traveled across the country training managers and workers at businesses and government agencies.

Pimentel’s training sessions laid fundamental groundwork for the adoption of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which was signed into law in 1990 and celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. 

A 2007 film about Pimentel’s life, "Music Within," was shot on the PSU campus and starred actors Ron Livingston and Michael Sheen. In 2008, Pimentel delivered PSU’s commencement address and was awarded an honorary doctorate degree.

We asked Pimentel to reflect on his time at PSU, the strides that have been made for people with disabilities in the 30 years since the passage of the ADA and what work still needs to be done.

What experiences and people at PSU contributed to your interest in working on disability rights issues?

The most important people who influenced me are well known to both the people of Portland and those of us who were at Portland State in the early ‘70s. 

The first was a student, Art Honeyman [’65 MA ’74], who was deeply involved in an assortment of social and political causes in Portland during those times. It was a decade of public protests, and Art could be found at the head of almost every public demonstration from our involvement in Vietnam [to] nuclear power, women’s rights, racial injustice and disability rights. He became a well-known figure at Saturday Market where he sold books of his poetry and stories of his growing up as a child with cerebral palsy. 

I was freshly back from Vietnam and disabled with hearing loss, a traumatic brain injury and Agent Orange poisoning. We became fast friends partly because we were both disabled but primarily because my hearing loss matched his speech pattern almost exactly and I was one of the few students who could understand him. 

When I saw how unfairly he was treated and excluded by society at that time I became angry. I also saw how badly disabled Vietnam vets were being treated. When we came back from Vietnam, we were often told we “deserved” to be disabled because we went to fight in an unjust war. Art once asked me how I would like to fight in a just one: civil rights for persons with disabilities.

The second person who had a significant influence on my journey into disability rights was Professor Ben Padrow. He was the head of the speech department, and he was one of the only people who supported a deaf person majoring in speech and wanting to become a professional speaker. He was a great mentor.  

He allowed me to shift my studies from general speech to changing society’s attitudes about people. This became instrumental in influencing employers to support the ADA when it was introduced and helped change persons with disabilities’ perceptions of themselves, which was vital to the disability civil rights movement. 

Can you discuss some of the training programs you have developed and the ways in which you contributed to the creation of the ADA?

There is an old African saying: “If you want to go fast, go alone, but if you want to go far, go with others.” The disability rights movement in the United States was not about going fast. It was about going far — so far that a list of those who contributed to the creation of the ADA could never be complete. I was never more than one of the many that worked for the goal. The goal? To create a world where persons with disabilities could live a spontaneous life. 

That in mind, I have a high profile in the field mostly because of the task I was elected to do — work on changing existing attitudes about persons with disabilities. To do this I became the developer and presenter of interactive training for employers, vocational rehabilitation, government and, most importantly, for persons with disabilities. 

I developed Windmills, an interactive attitude training that is used by employers to train managers and supervisors to be more confident and open to hiring and effectively supervising persons with disabilities. 

Windmills is also used by government agencies such as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and Department of Labor. It has been used internationally and over three thousand trainers have presented it. 

Without Limits is a Windmills program for youth with disabilities. It is an interactive training for students with disabilities and those in special education to advocate for themselves, effectively communicate with employers and educators and develop positive self-images. This was developed in cooperation with an outstanding local Portland organization, Dirkse Counseling & Consulting.

I am currently developing and presenting employer training on post-COVID-19 employment and “accommodating” survivors of Covid who will have impairments and disabilities from COVID-19, and I am doing leadership training for employers and organizations on resilience during this pandemic.

I was not the person who drove the development nor passage of the ADA. My job was to promote employer acceptance and support for the passage of the law. I was privileged to work with the EEOC on the original rules and regulations for the enforcement of the law when it was passed. 

I know that without the experiences and support received at Portland State I never would have had the privilege of being a part of this journey. 

What do you think have been the largest benefits of the ADA? What still needs to be done?

While societal changes and accessibility are vital, I focus on our main goal back in the early ‘70s. We wanted persons with disabilities to see their disability not as something that could or should be overcome, but as a valuable teacher. We felt that the very notion of “overcoming” your disability was as much nonsense as the notion of overcoming one’s race or ethnicity or gender or sexual identity or religion. 

My disabilities have at times been inconvenient and occasionally frustrating, but they have always been my best mentor. They have taught me confidence, tenacity, creativity, empathy, patience, courage and self-advocacy. The ADA has given generations of young people with disabilities the opportunity to see their challenges as not something they “play down” but as something they live up to and learn from. 

Before the ADA, when I came back from Vietnam disabled, I was told that I had to modify my dreams to fit my circumstances. I and countless generations of persons with disabilities were told this. 

We wanted a world where young people with disabilities were not told they had to modify their dreams to fit their circumstances but that they could modify their circumstances to fit their dreams. 

Now that persons with disabilities are beginning to believe this, we need those who teach, hire, work with and parent them to come to that same realization. As President Bush said 30 years ago, we celebrate your abilities and disabilities. Someday we will all realize they are equally valuable not only to those with disabilities but to everyone. This is the core of valuing diversity, and it is the next important step that needs to be taken.

In what ways has the pandemic showcased the importance of the ADA and/or its limitations? 

The pandemic has several disability issues that should be considered. The most obvious is those who cannot live independently or without assistance. We are aware of what happened to those in assisted living environments because of age. However, there are those who live in similar environments or need daily assistance because of physical, emotional and/or intellectual issues. We need to concentrate on establishing these as safe environments. 

Distance learning has challenged us all. But consider the challenges those students with hearing, vision, intellectual and other limitations may have. Making these new mediums of learning accessible is going to be particularly challenging for the average school system.

Employers are having people work from home. A challenge will be how to “accommodate” and supervise some employees with disabilities who are home when their accommodations and supports may be integrated into their traditional workplace. 

One of the challenges that many employers will have is how to accommodate those employees who survive COVID-19 but now have impairments from the virus. Heart, lung, fatigue, memory, post-traumatic stress and hearing problems are anticipated. Accommodating existing employees as well as applicants will be a challenge for employers.

How do you think your experience at PSU differs from that of current students with disabilities? 

When I tell the story of Art Honeyman and I being arrested in the pancake house under the “Ugly Law” that Portland had at that time, the audience is shocked. How could such a law exist? This is an example of how things have changed with the ADA. Before the law, this was commonplace. Before the ADA, parents of children with disabilities would be confronted and chided for bringing them into public places such as a department store or even a public park. The damage that this did to the child’s self esteem and identity is obvious. 

I remember when there was no signage or crosswalk on Broadway between the Viking Dorm and PSU. A student who used a wheelchair could not get to class without risking his life. The city would not install one so, after more than a few beers, someone — who will remain nameless — bought some paint and painted one. The problem was when the cars drove over it in the morning the paint was still wet and left paint marks down Broadway to Burnside street. The city council was less than amused. Who did this? I’ll never tell. 

Final thoughts?

Once you have gained ground do not give it back. We must protect what we have gained. There are those who would use the current events as an excuse to erode or suspend what has been accomplished, the goals that are important to you. You will know this is happening when you hear the words, “during these times it is just too much trouble.”

Remember: Just because someone has the right to do something does not mean it is the right thing to do.  

This is the best advice that Art Honeyman ever gave me: “No matter how difficult, there are no cons for doing the right thing. There are only cons for doing nothing.”