AODA Alliance
Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance Update
United for a Barrier-Free Ontario for All People with Disabilities
Website: www.aodaalliance.org
Email: aodafeedback@gmail.com
Twitter: @aodaalliance
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/aodaalliance
AODA Alliance Chair David Lepofsky’s Monthly Column in the Toronto Star’s Metroland Publications Across Ontario Calls on Premier Ford to Agree to Meet
May 20, 2025
SUMMARY
AODA Alliance Chair David Lepofsky’s May column in the Toronto Star’s many Metroland publications around Ontario urges Premier Doug Ford to agree to a meeting. This meeting is needed to share ideas on how the Premier can speed up the Government’s implementation of the landmark Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act. You can read this column below.
How You Can Help
- Email Premier Doug Ford. Tell him he should meet with the AODA Alliance Chair. His email address is Premier@Ontario.ca or fill out the form to submit a message to him at https://correspondence.premier.gov.on.ca/EN/feedback/default.aspx
- Forward the Premier a copy of this Metroland column. Copy a local news organization near you on your email to the Premier.
- You can also phone the Premier’s office at 416-325-1941. Let us know what response you get. Email us at aodafeedback@gmail.com
- Let your local media know what response you get from the Premier’s office.
MORE DETAILS
Inside Halton May 15, 2025
Originally posted at https://www.insidehalton.com/opinion/columnists/advocate-invites-premier-to-build-legacy-with-disabilities-act/article_cebaa2a0-7702-5530-b3ff-265bf8cfd1a0.html
Advocate invites premier to build legacy with disabilities act
Ontario is in an accessibility crisis and needs to implement a crisis response, writes David Lepofsky.
By David Lepofsky
David Lepofsky is chair of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance.
May 10 was a profoundly bittersweet day for 2.9 million Ontarians with disabilities.
Twenty years ago, on May 10, 2005, the Ontario Legislature unanimously passed the historic Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA), after people with disabilities tenaciously campaigned for a decade to win its enactment.
I had the honour of leading that grassroots campaign. Many who took part in our blitz in communities across Ontario are still alive to mark this anniversary.
Sadly, too many are no longer with us. I fondly cherish the visionary dedication of them all.
May 10 was a sweet anniversary because our relentless efforts led to Canada’s first comprehensive accessibility law being enacted in Canada.
The AODA required the Ontario government to have led the province to become accessible to people with all kinds of disabilities by 2025.
You can watch the historic final vote in the Legislature on May 10, 2005, the enthusiastic standing ovation that MPPs gave the act’s passage, and the optimistic Queen’s Park news conference that day with speakers from the government, myself giving the disability perspective, and the business sector.
The idea for this legislation and its key ingredients all came bottom-up from the disability community, not top-down from the government.
It inspired later passage of accessibility legislation in Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and at the federal level. We await other provinces that will hopefully follow suit.
At the same time, this May 10 was a bitter anniversary.
Two decades later, Ontario is nowhere near its mandatory goal of full accessibility. There have been improvements in accessibility over these 20 years, thanks to our efforts.
However, Ontarians with disabilities continue to face barrier after barrier when they try to get a job, ride public transit, get an education in our schools, get health care services, or try to enjoy the other things that other residents take for granted.
Ontario is in an accessibility crisis and needs to implement a crisis response.
That is the wise advice that the government received two years ago from an independent review of the disabilities act conducted by Rich Donovan.
The government selected Donovan to conduct a mandatory review of the disabilities act’s implementation and enforcement.
An earlier government-appointed independent review by former Lt. Gov. David Onley sounded a comparable alarm more than six years ago.
Premier Ford now has a fresh new mandate to govern, and a majority government that can act boldly in this area. We need him to do so. Everyone has a disability now or is bound to get one later.
Disability accessibility is a bipartisan and non-partisan issue.
We invite and encourage the premier to take a fresh look at this file and to decide that he wants a positive legacy of his government to be fulfilment of the aims of the act.
A positive and helpful way for Ford to begin his new term in office would be a meeting with AODA Alliance representatives.
The alliance and other disability advocates are now gearing up to forge ahead with our accessibility campaign.
We’re as tenacious as ever and are ready to offer the government constructive ideas. The premier has prided himself in being a leader who will pick up the phone and reach out directly. We’d welcome a call.
David Lepofsky is a retired lawyer who chairs the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance, and is a visiting professor of disability rights at the law schools at Western and the University of Ottawa.