Mission businesses hit with ‘drive-by’ disability lawsuits

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Many businesses in the Mission have been targeted by vandals. Photo courtesy of Mission Local.

By Rigoberto Hernandez, Mission Local

The owners of Elsy’s Restaurant on Mission Street have faced their share of roadblocks to operate in San Francisco.

For reasons that are still unclear, the San Francisco Planning Department delayed Elsy’s opening for eight months in 2006. In 2008, a corrupt restaurant inspector asked the owners for money in exchange for a food handler’s certificate. The inspector was later fired by the Department of Public Health. Finally, in 2009, they thought they would be able to focus on their Salvadoran cuisine.

Then in January 2010, noted serial litigator Thomas Frankovich sued Elsy’s for an alleged violating the 1990 Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), which requires buildings to be accessible to people with disabilities. The lawsuit alleged that Craig Yates, who is paraplegic, had difficulty accessing Elsy’s cashier counter and bathroom.

As with most of the lawsuits filed by Frankovich, Elsy’s owners decided to settle and make the required alterations, which involved lowering the cashier counter about 8 inches and building a new wheelchair-accessible bathroom. The old bathroom was in a back room near the kitchen and required negotiating a small set of stairs.

“All of this cost us money,” said owner Jaime Gonzalez, detailing the list of expenses: about $100,000 for the fixes and $17,000 to settle the lawsuit.

They aren’t the only ones. Frankovich has sued at least 23 businesses in the Mission since January 2010 — most of them small, minority-owned restaurants.

Read the complete story at Mission Local. 

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Many businesses in the Mission have been targeted by vandals. Photo courtesy of Mission Local.

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