SACRAMENTO — When Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed Senate Bill 1608 into law last year, politicians and interest groups alike hailed the legislation as a road map to increased public access for the disabled and fewer lawsuits targeting businesses.
Fourteen months later, there’s scant evidence that the new law has produced either benefit. Attorneys on both sides of the issue say the number of lawsuits brought under state and federal disability access laws has not dropped. Few businesses display the newly created window signs meant to show customers — and would-be litigants — that they’ve sought access inspections. And a new commission charged with creating a master access-compliance checklist for building inspectors only met for the first time in October and is already hamstrung by a relatively skimpy $80,000 budget.
