Kirola v. City & County of San Francisco, The

Background

The plaintiffs moved for a permanent injunction concerning alleged violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act Accessibility Guidelines (ADAAG) at 11 identified facilities. The motion followed a prior related proceeding and an appellate mandate requiring post-trial briefing about the alleged violations. The court considered only evidence presented at the 2011 trial. It did not consider evidence about renovations completed after trial or later site inspections.

The defendants conceded six violations and agreed to remedy them: the step into both restrooms at the Botanical Gardens; the excessive slope inside the playground entrance gate at the Bernal Heights Recreation Center; entrance-gate hardware at that center; uninsulated sink hot-water and drain pipes there; missing accessible signage at the Woh Hei Yuen Recreation Center; and the toilet-stall door latch at the Martin Luther King Swimming Pool.

Court’s findings

The court found sufficient evidence of ADAAG violations at the Minnie and Lovie Ward Recreation Center. The evidence concerned excessive ramp slopes, noncompliant handrails, inaccessible routes to the ball fields, a dirt path to the tennis courts, drainage and overgrown planting that restricted paths, and missing accessible signage. The court rejected the defendants’ argument that the evidence was too nonspecific and granted injunctive relief for the Ward Recreation Center.

The court also found sufficient evidence of violations at other facilities, including:

- Botanical Gardens: ramps that were too steep and lacked required handrails; an excessive cross-slope leading to the men’s accessible restroom stall; men’s restroom accessories mounted too high; women’s restroom stalls that were too narrow for wheelchair entry; and paper-towel dispensers mounted too high. - Bernal Heights Recreation Center: a playground surface consisting of sand; restroom entrance thresholds that were about one inch high instead of no more than one-half inch; and accessible toilet-stall clearances that were too narrow. - Tenderloin Recreation Center: an excessive floor cross-slope in the girls’ first-floor restroom; mounted hardware that was too high in both first-floor restrooms; second-floor men’s and women’s restrooms that were inaccessible because of obstructed clearances; and a nonfunctional elevator. - Woh Hei Yuen Recreation Center: bathrooms that wheelchair users could not enter and close properly. - Upper Noe Recreation Center: restroom doors that required more than the permitted opening force and closed too quickly.

The court found the evidence insufficient to establish that the sloping floor in the Tenderloin Recreation Center’s first-floor boys’ restroom was an ADAAG violation. It also found no violation that could be remedied concerning alleged missing accessible signage at Upper Noe. Finally, the testimony about similar barriers at the Eureka Valley, Gene Friend, Joseph Lee, and Richmond Recreation Centers was insufficient to establish violations or support an order requiring a remedy.

Rulings on the parties’ requests

The court denied the defendants’ request for judicial notice of a San Francisco Recreation & Parks webpage stating that renovations at the Ward Recreation Center had been completed. The court also denied as moot the defendants’ administrative motion to file a sur-reply because it did not consider evidence outside the trial record.

Disposition and next steps

The court granted in part and denied in part the plaintiffs’ motion for injunctive relief. It ordered the parties to meet and confer and file a proposed injunction by September 18, 2024, including a timeline for remedying the violations. It also ordered additional briefing on whether broader injunctive relief was necessary and, if so, its scope. The parties were directed to submit a proposed briefing schedule and page limit by September 4, 2024.