Orlando Housing settles disability case for $400K

The Orlando Housing Authority has agreed to pay a $400,000 settlement for placing a disabled and now-deceased man in a thirdfloor walkup unit with no room for a live-in health aide.

Last week, the federal government found the Orlando Housing Authority failed to comply with fair housing rules regarding the way it treated Sanford resident Samuel Rosario, who died at the age of 54. Attorneys say the case follows a pattern of the authority denying disabled residents their rights to accommodations, including ground-floor units, better lighting, shower grab bars and closer parking spaces. The authority has had multiple compliance issues with HUD in recent years, records show.

Orlando attorney Belvin Perry, part of the team that represented Rosario’s family in winning the settlement, said the former resident of Logan Heights

Apartments “could be living comfortably in a ground floor, two-bedroom unit with a live-in aide” if not for the failures of the Orlando Housing Authority.

Rosario suffered legal blindness, seizures and memory loss when the housing group moved his belongings from a second-floor apartment in Sanford public housing to a third-floor unit in a nearby complex in 2011, records show. His daughter said he often needed help to climb the three flights of stairs. Family members pushed the housing authority to get Rosario into a ground-floor apartment with a spare room for a health aide.

The housing authority never moved him.

In May, 2014, he fell in his apartment and died.

Vivian Bryant, who oversees the authority, said Rosario’s family members were inconsistent in requesting a first-floor rental for him and that he was an alcoholic.

But in hopes of preventing similar problems, the agency has hired a staff disability specialist and is converting more units to accommodate disabled residents, she added.

“Yes, there have been positive changes to OHA’s policies and procedures to ensure reasonable accommodation for our disabled residents,” she said. “We believe these improvements will help us ensure that we do not face this situation again.”

Rosario’s case was complicated with conflicting findings regarding his disabilities.

The authority turned down his request for “reasonable accommodations” following an initial denial of Social Security disability benefits, which was later reversed. Family members and lawyers said his disabilities were apparent and confirmed in a doctor’s note.

Safer accommodations for disabled residents cost little or nothing and yet allow residents to live independently “or as in this case, [is] the difference between life and death,” according to a statement from Perry’s law firm, Morgan & Morgan.

Matthew Dietz, an attorney for the nonprofit group Disability Independence Group Inc., worked on the case with Perry and said the Orlando Housing Authority should inform its disabled tenants about their right to live safely rather than oppose their requests.

“For years prior to Mr. Rosario’s death, Orlando Housing Authority, and their management, have unlawfully created high barriers for persons with disabilities to obtain reasonable accommodations by applying a stringent definition of disability, requiring excessive documentation, and delaying processing of accommodation requests,” he stated.

The case follows a string of similar complaints against the authority that were outlined in court records.

In April 2012, the authority entered into a consent agreement after it denied resident Ralph Fidelman’s request for a two-bedroom unit following a doctor’s recommendation.

A March 2011 request for a live-in aide to assist Lou Ann Lukasiewcz was delayed because correspondence was not on letterhead stationary.

Orlando Housing Authority paid damages based on an October 2009 complaint from resident Joseph Checklowski, who got the settlement and a housing voucher. The authority had denied his request for a three-bedroom apartment to provide space for medical equipment and a live-in aide.

Resident Mary Bernadin’s May 2011 request for a raised toilet and grab bars was approved on the condition that she sign a personal-injury release form.

Stephanie Fernandez, Rosario’s daughter, said she feels her father died in vain. She said she talked or visited with him daily and made sure someone checked on him every day. Just before he died, she invited him to a family dinner, but he declined.

Then he fell for the last time.