Groups aim to make trick or treating more accessible

In Halloweens past, 10-year-old Emile Laliberte struggled to find a costume that wouldn’t be hidden by his wheelchair.

But Emile looks to be the envy of all the children on his block as he sets out trick or treating on Oct. 31 as a green dragon with 3D-printed scales, motorized wings and glowing animated eyes to watch over the Styrofoam castle that surrounds his wheelchair.

“I will impress the kids,” Emile said. “Kids with special needs have (a) right to wear a costume with their wheelchair.”

Handyman Robert Murphy said the costume, made in collaboration with Concordia University’s Milieux Institute for Arts, Culture and Technology, is the first in what the group of Montreal crafters hope will become a holiday tradition. Next year, Chad the dragon — a name picked by Emile — will be passed on to another kid as the team embarks on its next wheelchair-customized Halloween creation.

The project, which is called Rolloween, is part of a growing push in Canada to make the frights and delights of Halloween more inclusive for children with disabilities and special needs.

In a Vancouver suburb, Lucille Ayers said thousands of people flock to the Coquitlam Halloween House over 12 days of wheelchair-accessible thrills including a pumpkin patch, graveyards, fortune tellers and eerie effects.

Ayers said it’s her 19th year of turning her home into a house of horrors, and all proceeds have been donated to Variety, a charity for children with special needs, which is why it was important to her family that the spooky attractions were accessible.

“All of the children in the charity that Variety helps have disabilities, so we want to emulate that,” she said. “We take the extra time with them. They come out; they’re just beaming. It’s just things they don’t ever get to do.” That mission extends to the adult volunteers who help out with the event, said Ayers, many of whom have special needs.

“So often, [people with disabilities] are isolated,” she said. “I think every opportunity they can get to participate in the typical community, and be a part of it, is really important. I think that should be happening all the time.”