Thanks for your response. I read the federal law you cite and it seems you are right.

How does that fit with this statement from California’s website?

Travel parking placard for nonresidents who plan to travel in California and are a disabled person or disabled veteran. Valid for up to 90 days or the date noted by your licensed medical professional on the application, whichever is less.

23 C.F.R. PART 1235—UNIFORM SYSTEM FOR PARKING FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES

I agree.

In the incident I described, one of the three young people may have been disabled. I only use them as an example of what I believe to be a problem with abuse and the police’s lack of interest in solving it.

Not long ago, I pulled up into a disabled space at a grocery store and was greeted by a man in an orange vest that said Portland Police on it. He asked me if the tag hanging from my mirror belonged to me. He asked to see it. It satisfied him. He was out there awhile checking every car that parked in a disabled space. I watched for about thirty minutes while I leaned on a shopping cart. He wrote several tickets. Obviously, people are abusing it.

I know that this story goes against my original assertion that the police don’t care. This man was not a regular officer. I talked to him for a few minutes. He’s more or less a volunteer. I asked him if there was a similar program in my city, which neighbors Portland. He said that there is when there is a volunteer, which isn’t that often. Enforcement happens, but not a lot.

“No problem” about posting your comments. I’m happy to get any comments in the early stages of this site, and I’ve never been one to stifle disagreements. They make things interesting. I’m trying to decide about your strong language about Mr. McDonald. I usually prefer that people disagree with substance rather than make things personal.

I see your point and it seems like some history between two people I don’t know. I have been troubled by a lot of the interpretation of policies by local brokerages, especially when they take the same state rules and apply them so differently.

That becomes a sore point with my customers, who see me doing things with their friends that I tell them I can’t do with them. I think the brokerages sometimes forget that our customers often know each other.

Another example of this is that one brokerage in the Portland area will not allow contractors to take customers to the Oregon Coast for inclusion activities and others will. When my customers at the brokerage who won’t hear from customers at brokerages who will, it’s very hard to explain.

I appreciate your response and your willingness to post my remarks in a moderated forum. Even more I appreciate your elucidation of where your professional boundaries lie. I had no issue whatsoever with your original post. I thought it was well thought out and reasonable. It was the saber-rattling that sprung forth in the comments section that put a bee in my bonnet. I think disabilities entitlement programs are a worthy and useful use of tax dollars but I do get tired of one-note polemicists like Mr. McDonald pretending that government money is the solution to every problem and those entities charged as custodians of those dollars are all part of an evil cabal whose life purpose is to deny people with disabilities of services for the pure joy of watching them suffer. I know a whole lot of dedicated people in the disabilities community in Oregon and I’m yet to meet one member of the secret Let’s Screw Over the People with Disabilities club that is the bread and butter of Mr. McDonald’s tireless and useless faux-advocacy. I know incompetent people and deeply gifted people, people who think money is a solution and people who think it can harm more than it helps, but I have yet to meet the diabolical money-grubbing soul sucker who spends his time counting the pieces of gold he’s earned from gleefully stomping on the rights of people with disabilities. It’s a straw man argument that adds nothing to the complex challenges of serving an increasingly diverse and increasingly self-directed population. Thank you for providing a forum for these important discussion.

Yours,
Hunter