“I am honored you have joined us today for this exciting announcement. And I am especially honored to tell you that we are here today because a mother fought to make the world more accessible for her child.
When I was first elected I sat at a small table in a tiny coffee shop in Wauwatosa and looked out the window as a mother carefully positioned her son in a wheelchair, and then preceded to maneuver the chair away from their minivan, through the snowy February air, and up a bumpy pathway into the coffee shop. I was about to meet Sarah and Matthew.
Sarah sat down, gave Matthew a snack, and prepared to pitch me her vision for a Wisconsin that was more accessible for her son.
I was a brand new legislator, about a month on the job, and Sarah and Matthew wasted no time making an appointment to speak with me. She shared her concerns about the lack of adult-sized changing stations in public places for people with disabilities. She shared that her son Matthew had been unable to go to basketball games, museums, and airports because, then at age 19, he had to be changed on the floor of public restrooms or in the back of their van.
I looked back to the snow falling outside, and realized how cold it was. That was no weather for changing in the back of a van.
She explained that when buildings aren’t accessible, people can’t visit them. This affects the person living with disabilities, and their family members. It affects parents, it affects siblings. And she asked me to write legislation to help. After she left that day I was determined to figure out what we could do.
Access to changing stations is an issue of public health and of human dignity. We have a population of people in need who are going unseen because they are unable to participate in society. As Sarah taught me that cold February day, since the buildings don't work for the people, the people aren't going to the buildings.
If we want families to live, work, visit, and stay in Wisconsin, we have to make sure that our state is accessible to everyone. Everyone deserves access to public spaces, and bathroom use should not prevent someone from enjoying and participating in our communities and our society. I am working, along with my colleagues, to make Wisconsin a more accessible state.
The Wisconsin State Capitol is “The People’s House,” and The People’s House must be accessible for all people. The lack of a universal changing station in the State Capitol has meant students were unable to join their class to visit, families were unable to visit, and the People’s House has not been accessible to everyBODY. But this has changed, and this is a change worth celebrating. Senator Agard and I are celebrating today because The People’s House is now accessible to more people. This is how we move forward, together.
I want to thank Brookfield mother Sarah Knowles for her tenacious advocacy, Senator Melissa Agard for her partnership in the state Senate, DOA for their hard work designing the changes, and the SCERB board for their unanimous support.
And now I want to turn the microphone over the tenacious mother who brought us all here today. I wasn’t the first elected official she pitched her hopes and dreams for a more accessible world to, and when she met resistance, she kept going, and from that persistence she has seen success. Sarah is who I credit today. We now have a bill that has achieved bipartisan support, Governor Evers has included this bill in his new proposed budget, Brookfield Library now has a Universal Changing Station because of her advocacy, and now–right here in the Wisconsin State Capitol–the People of Wisconsin have a Universal Changing Station thanks to Sarah’s tenacity, grace and grit.
Sarah Knowles, thank you for your work."
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