the concerns of the representatives of privately-owned systems that do not benefit from public subsidies.

But these fears of undue burdens are not justified. Accessible public transit has been operating productively in many communities for years. As technology and public attitudes mature, as other aspects of the environment become accessible, and as incentives for productivity are refined, accessible public transit will be accomplished with increasing economy, increasing ridership and increasing profitability to operators, to tax payers, and to every citizen of this nation.

Mr. Chairman, the time has come for fiscally and morally responsible Government leadership to lay the foundation for a fully just and productive society. We cannot continue to pass the unconscionable social and financial burdens of discrimination to our children. ADA must not be amended to a statement of partial equality because partial equality is not equality, and partial equality is no longer tolerable to Americans with disabilities.

Partial equality written into law simply institutionalizes discrimination and guarantees more segregation, more unemployment and more public and private expenditures for welfare. Mr. Chairman, the Americans With Disabilities Act must be passed as a true mandate for equality and for productivity.

I thank you.

Mr. MINETA. Mr. Dart, thank you very, very much for your very fine statement, very moving statement from the bottom of your heart. Let me ask about the work of the Task Force. How would you say that the work of your Task Force has been incorporated into the ADA bill, itself?

Mr. DART. Many members of our Task Force have conferred with the Congressional leadership and writers of the ADA in both houses. They have conferred with individuals in the White House and with all who have been concerned with writing the Americans With Disabilities Act. I would to add, Mr. Chairman, that I did preside at 63 public forums, at least one in each of the 50 states. These forums were attended by several thousand, more than 8,000, individuals. I have addressed other meetings, maybe 100 other meetings, attended by almost 20,000 persons in the last 18 months in every state on this subject.

We have made every effort to distill the information which we gained and to convey it to the Congress and to the White House. Mr. MINETA. I have heard repeatedly that non-accessible public transportation is one of the principal barriers to employment of the disabled. Does this situation vary in different parts of the country such as between urban and rural areas, or does it have a uniformly negative impact on employment of our fine fellow citizens who, unfortunately, are struck with disabilities regardless of where they might be living?

Mr. DART. It is my impression and experience that the lack of transportation is a problem which is universal and which exists in every community in the United States, be it large or small.

Mr. MINETA. Do you believe that the ADA goes far enough in removing the transportation barrier to employment?

Mr. DART. Mr. Chairman, the Americans With Disabilities Act is not going to solve all of the problems of people with disabilities. It

is an essential foundation for all other solutions because, until we eliminate the insidious assumption that people with disabilities are less than fully human, and until we eliminate the discrimination that results from that assumption by a mandate for equality to every citizen of this nation, we are not going to solve all of the other problems.

I think it will begin to solve the transportation problems. But it will be a beginning, an essential beginning.

Mr. MINETA. Thank you. That is very, very fine.

Mr. Duncan?

Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Dart, thank you for a very fine statement. I just want to ask you one thing. It seems that almost everything we do up here benefits big business and the big giant corporations in the end. Yet it seems as if the Federal government is driving small business out of existence in this country at a very rapid rate no matter what field you look at.

I am a little bit concerned. Do you think that this bill will hit adversely on small business or cause more small businesses to go out of existence?

Mr. DART. I do not believe so. As a matter of fact, as a person who has been a small businessman, have been a founder and a chief executive officer of three small businesses and of a business that, fortunately, became larger-and I have done all of the things which are required by this act. I know as Chairman of the President's Committee and through my researches over the years, over the last ten years, that all of the requirements of this bill are being complied with successfully and productively by some small businesses somewhere, that I think I can tell you that I know that properly implemented, properly enforced and implemented, with common sense as I know our administration will do it, that this bill will not negatively impact small businesses.

As a matter of fact, it will help them because people with disabilities are the natural customers of the neighborhood small business, and they are the natural employees of the neighborhood small business. If they can get into the small business and if they can overcome the attitudinal barriers that now prevent them from being employed.

Mr. DUNCAN. Have you seen this editorial from The New York Times, September 6, which says, Blank Check for the Disabled? Mr. DART. Yes, I have.

Mr. DUNCAN. What do you think about that editorial?

Mr. DART. I think that that editorial is not correct. I think that, at some point in our addressing of this subject, we need to ask not only how much is it going to cost to have equality, but how much does it cost not to have it and how much are we going to profit by investing in productivity as our forefathers have wisely done throughout the history of this nation.

Mr. DUNCAN. I was told a few days ago that one of the major cities in the West had put lifts on their buses within the last few years and that they had found that they were being used once every two days on the average, and that they had found it was less expensive to just provide individual vans or more personalized transportation to the disabled. Is that what you are talking about when mention in your testimony paratransits?

Mr. DART. In regard to the situation which you address about the apparently low ridership of lift-equipped mainline public transit, I believe that we are in the pioneering stages of this great initiative to make our society accessible to millions of people with disabilities. I think the same arguments were made against early trains, and early airplanes and early cars, which were demonstrably inferior at one time to horses and buggies.

I think that is true. That sounds like a joke, but they were demonstrably inferior, at some point in their development, to horses and buggies. People ask why are we going to subsidize railroads that carry no passengers to the nowhere that exists in the Western wilderness of this country.

I believe, Mr. Congressman, that it is virtually certain that, as technology improves, as the accessibility of this society improves, as people with disabilities lose their fear of addressing society— and, of course, that is the whole point of ADA, to make equality popular and fashionable and acceptable. As those things occur, I think you will see that the ridership and the utilization of accessible public transit will become very profitable and will become an investment in the productivity of this nation.

Mr. DUNCAN. What you are really saying is that this unnecessary unemployment that you mention, you think that the government will end up making money because of increased tax revenues and so forth if some of these unemployed disabled people are able to have income and so forth? Is that what you are saying?

Mr. DART. I think the government will make money. Tax payers will make money. Families will make money. Businesses will make money. We do well to recall that-I can recall that, and many of my colleagues that are younger maybe don't-that as we approached the Civil Rights Act of '64, I was a small businessman. I lived in the segregated South. I went to meetings where it was confidently predicted that if black people were allowed to come into our businesses, we would all go bankrupt.

What happened? We had the biggest boom in the history of human culture.

Mr. DUNCAN. Of the 43 million disabled Americans that you mention in your testimony, how many of those would use these lifts on public transit?

Mr. DART. Of the how many?

Mr. DUNCAN. You say in your testimony that there are 43 million disabled Americans. But I assume that you are talking about some who have epilepsy or other forms of disabilities who would not use these lifts. I am just wondering how many of those 43 million would use these lifts and other devices that you are asking to be put on public transit systems?

Mr. DART. I have heard the estimate that there are approximately, at this time, 7 million potential users. This figure will, certainly, increase as the proportion of our population of elderly persons and persons with disabilities does increase and is increasing.

Mr. DUNCAN. Just one more question. The last witness who was here, you heard Congressman Shuster end up with a story. He said that the President had lunch a few days ago with another member of Congress, and apparently expressed surprise that this law might apply to small charter bus companies who had only five buses, or

something like that. Is it your understanding that this law would apply even to very small bus companies with, say, one or two buses?

Mr. Dart. I am not familiar with the exact question that was asked the President. Or, of course, with his answer, I am not entirely sure what the question was. I will say this, that I have been present at meetings with the President and heard his views on this bill and the equality of people with disabilities.

It is my experience that he is totally dedicated to having a civil rights law, and a real civil rights law, for people with disabilities. Mr. DUNCAN. So it would apply to all companies regardless of size, period; is that what you are saying?

Mr. DART. I leave that up to some of my attorney friends who will follow. I think it should indeed-and hopefully will-apply, if you want my personal opinion, to all buses, eventually.

Mr. DUNCAN. Thank you very much.

Mr. MINETA. Mr. Payne?

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Dart, thank you very much for being here today. I have long admired your success in business and, certainly, very much appreciate the work that you have done as chairperson of this very important Task Force. I think you have made a tremendous contribution to all of America. Certainly, all of us appreciate what you have done. I recognize, as you point out in your testimony, that this is not a matter of dollars and cents, or cost and benefits. Certainly, it is a matter of civil rights and equality first and foremost. As you have described yourself, a man of keen fiscal responsibility, and certainly you have proven that in your business life, perhaps you have looked at the fact that today we can quantify that the cost to our society of the more than 8 million citizens that are unnecessarily unemployed, is $246 billion, or the President has used $300 billion. I guess my question is, has the Task Force looked at attempting to quantify what this legislation might do in terms of reducing that cost from $246 billion to some other number; in other words, the quantified benefits of this legislation as it is now written. Has there been any attempt to quantify that?

Mr. DART. We have not attempted to make estimates in that regard. I am not sure to what extent one could make a responsible estimate. I believe I have stated to the Chairman previously that this is not going to solve all of the problems of people with disabilities. This is not going to result in the instant employment of those 8 million plus, or 10 million, individuals. It is, however, an essential foundation for the eventual employment of those individuals. I believe that. I have been in disability policy for ten years now, and I have been doing it full time. I have been to every state three times gathering information on this, at least most of them seven or eight times. I am absolutely convinced that we are never going to solve our problems, the problems of people with disabilities, until we can eliminate the assumption that we are less than fully human and, therefore, not eligible for the same rights and services as other people.

I think buses are a good example. Nobody is talking about taking air conditioning which costs more than lifts off of buses. I ride in a car without air conditioning. We could, easily, ride in buses with

out air conditioning. They do it in many countries in the world that are very hot. And the buses get there just as quickly as ours, get to their destination.

We very easily say that it might be too expensive to take people with disabilities anywhere. But we do not say that we are willing to give up our air conditioning to allow people with disabilities to get out of the back rooms and off of social welfare.

I think that tells you something, Mr. Congressman, about how we think of the equality and the humanity of people with disabilities.

Mr. PAYNE. I thank you very much for that statement. Again, thank you for all that you have done in this matter. I yield back my time.

Mr. MINETA. When we talk about these costs, I think figures can be bandied about. Just taking a very quick look at how much is being expended totally in this whole field of transportation or transit by all levels of government, I think you could probably get to about $15 billion or so being spent.

At the same time, even if we were to assume some of the figures that Mr. Shuster used here, and I believe he used the figure $150 million for capital costs of lifts and maintenance of those lifts with the life of the bus, $150 million. $150 million in the realm of a $15 billion environment involving all of transit, really, is not that much in terms of the proportion.

As you have just very eloquently stated, the cost of air conditioning of that fleet is so much more than the cost of the lift. So it is a matter of values. I think you have put a finger on the issue very, very clearly.

Mr. Dart, I would like to, again, thank you very much for your presence here-Mr. Duncan?

Mr. DUNCAN. I would just like to ask one other question. You mentioned the buses in foreign countries. I am just curious, are there any countries where they have the requirements that are in this Act such as the special lifts and the special bathrooms and so forth on the buses? I don't know. I just was curious. You mentioned the buses in other countries.

Mr. DART. Mr. Congressman, I must tell you that I don't know either. But there are many of my colleagues in the room who do know. It is my impression that buses of that nature do exists in foreign countries. But I am going to ask you to ask that question to somebody who can give you a really accurate answer.

Mr. DUNCAN. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. MINETA. Thank you very much, again, Mr. Dart. We appreciate your being here, and especially thank you for your work as Chair of this Task Force. The results of your efforts are well-known and have been embodied, I can see, in the ADA bill. Thank you very, very much.

At this time, we will take a break and come back at 2:15.

[Whereupon, at 1:35 p.m., the Subcommittee adjourned, to reconvene at 2:15 that same day.]