1.    This action is brought by the United States pursuant to Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (“ADA”), 42 U.S.C. §§ 12181 et seq., against Starline Tours of Hollywood, Inc. (“Starline”).

2.    This Court has jurisdiction over this action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 12188(b)(1)(B) and 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331 and 1345.

3.    The United States is authorized to initiate this action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 12188(b).

4.    Venue in the United States District Court for the Central District of California is proper pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1391(b).

5.    Defendant Starline is a privately owned and operated company located in Los Angeles, California.  Starline provides tours and operates tour buses and charter shuttles to major attractions in Hollywood and the greater Los Angeles area.  Starline offers more than thirty different tours and serves approximately one million passengers a year.

6.    Upon information and belief, Starline is a public accommodation that owns, leases, leases to, or operates a terminal, depot, or other station used for specified public transportation within the meaning of 42 U.S.C. §§ 12181(7)(G) and 12181(10), and Title III’s implementing regulations, 28 C.F.R. § 36.104 and 49 C.F.R. § 37.3.  Upon information and belief, Starline is also a public accommodation that owns, leases, leases to, or operates a rental or sales establishment within the meaning of 42 U.S.C. § 12181(7)(E), and Title III’s implementing regulation, 28 C.F.R. § 36.104.

7.    Starline, with respect to some of its operations, is a private entity primarily engaged in the business of transporting people, whose operations affect commerce and which provides specified public transportation services, 42 U.S.C. § 12184; 49 C.F.R. § 37.103.  Starline, with respect to other of its operations, is a private entity that provides specified public transportation services and is not primarily engaged in the business of transporting people.  42 U.S.C. § 12182(b)(2)(B), (C), (D); 49 C.F.R. § 37.101. 

8.    Starline operates a fixed route system or systems within the meaning of 42 U.S.C. §§ 12181(4) and 49 C.F.R. § 37.3.  In particular, Starline offers “Hop-on, Hop-off” sightseeing tours that feature double-decker tour buses with both live and recorded narration identifying landmarks and other points of interest.  The “Hop-on, Hop-off” sightseeing tours include more than fifty stops in four separate but interconnected loops including, inter alia, Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, Universal City, and downtown Los Angeles.  Starline operates approximately thirty-eight “Hop-on, Hop-off” daily tours.  On information and belief, a significant percentage of Starline’s “Hop-on, Hop-off tour” vehicles are not accessible to individuals who use wheelchairs.

9.    Starline also operates a demand-responsive system or systems within the meaning of 42 U.S.C. §§ 12181(3) and 49 C.F.R. 37.3, in that Starline offers tours and transportation services that do not have a fixed route, fixed times, or fixed stops, or fixed durations.

10.    Starline has failed to provide tour buses or other tour vehicles which are accessible to and usable by people with disabilities who use wheelchairs within the meaning of Title III and its implementing regulations, 49 C.F.R. pt 37 and 49 C.F.R. pt. 38, thereby excluding such persons from Starline’s services.  Starline has also failed to provide demand responsive service to individuals with disabilities that is equivalent to that provided to individuals without disabilities.  42 U.S.C. § 12182(b)(1)(C); 49 C.F.R. § 37.101(d).  Starline therefore violated the ADA by failing to afford people with disabilities who use wheelchairs, on the basis of their disability, the opportunity to participate in or benefit from the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, or accommodations afforded to other individuals.  Further, Starline failed to provide appropriate training to its employees regarding its legal obligations under relevant federal statutes and regulations, in violation of the ADA.  49 C.F.R. § 37.173.  Upon information and belief, Starline’s violations of the ADA are continuing.

11.    Amy L. Champlin has Friedreich’s Ataxia, an inherited disease affecting the muscles and heart that causes nervous system damage and movement problems.  Friedreich’s Ataxia typically begins in childhood and leads to impaired muscle coordination that gradually worsens over time.  Ms. Champlin’s condition has necessitated her use of an electric wheelchair for mobility.  Ms. Champlin is substantially limited in the major life activity of walking and the major bodily function of the nervous system, and is an individual with a disability within the meaning of the ADA, 42 U.S.C. §§ 12102(1), (2); 28 C.F.R. § 36.104.

12.    In or about July 2010, Ms. Champlin telephoned Starline and requested information about scheduling a tour during her upcoming visit to Los Angeles to attend the Annual Membership Meeting of the National Ataxia Foundation in March 2011.  Starline personnel informed Ms. Champlin that individuals who use wheelchairs could only take a tour if they were able to walk onto the bus and then collapse their wheelchairs.

13.    On August 14, 2010, Ms. Champlin sent Starline a letter in which she reiterated her request for accessible tours for herself and others attending the Annual Membership Meeting of the National Ataxia Foundation and referred Starline to requirements of the ADA.  Ms. Champlin did not receive any response to her letter.

14.    In early January 2011, another member of the National Ataxia Foundation planning to attend the Annual Membership Meeting in Los Angeles contacted Starline about wheelchair accessible tours and was informed that Starline had just acquired a new accessible vehicle.  Several members therefore renewed their efforts to book accessible tours during their visit to Los Angeles in March 2011.

15.    On January 13, 2011, Ms. Champlin sent an email to Starline in which she requested information on Starline’s policies about persons using wheelchairs.  In response, Ms. Champlin received an email from Starline stating that Starline had accessible vehicles available for all of its tours, conditioned on advance notice of five or twenty-four hours, depending upon the tour.

16.    On January 13, 2011, Ms. Champlin sent another email to Starline in which she stated that she would be giving more than two months notice and asked for more specific information about the vehicles, such as the number of tie-down spots for wheelchairs and the ability to accommodate additional passengers who could transfer from their wheelchairs to vehicle seats.  In response, Ms. Champlin received an email from Starline stating that only three of Starline’s tours (Tour #1, Tour #2, and Tour #25) were accessible to persons using a wheelchair and that Starline had a total of three accessible vehicles, each of which could tie down two wheelchairs and could accommodate additional passengers able to transfer to a seat and collapse their wheelchairs.  Eventually, Ms. Champlin and several other members of the National Ataxia Foundation were able to book a Starline Tour for March 17, 2011, and purchased reservations that specified that an accessible vehicle would be provided.

17.    On the evening of March 16, 2011, Ms. Champlin and other members of the National Ataxia Foundation confirmed with Starline their reservation of a wheelchair accessible, lift-equipped vehicle for the tour purchased for the next day, March 17, 2011, which was to pick them up at their hotel at 7:30 a.m.

18.     On the morning of March 17, 2011, Starline sent a vehicle that was not wheelchair accessible to pick up Ms. Champlin and her companions at their hotel.  The Starline driver then suggested to Ms. Champlin and the other individuals using wheelchairs that they walk onto the bus and stow their wheelchairs.

19.    One of Ms. Champlin’s companions contacted Starline, which stated that a different vehicle, which was wheelchair accessible, would be sent to pick them up for the tour.

20.    The replacement vehicle did not arrive until 11:30 a.m., four hours after the scheduled start of the tour purchased by Ms. Champlin and her companions.  After the group engaged in a thirty minute process to board the vehicle, tie-down two wheelchairs, and stow an additional wheelchair, the vehicle would not start.  The driver informed the passengers that the particular vehicle was very rarely used and that it had been experiencing difficulties before he picked up the passengers.  The driver also informed the passengers that he had been instructed to keep them on the vehicle until another replacement vehicle was sent.

21.    Ms. Champlin and her companions waited in the non-functioning vehicle for an additional two hours, in considerable discomfort, but another replacement vehicle did not arrive.  Eventually, they disembarked from the vehicle and relinquished their plan to take a tour while visiting Los Angeles.

22.    The United States is informed and believes that Starline owns or leases approximately ninety vehicles, the solicitations for purchase or lease of which were after August 25, 1990, five of which are readily accessible to or usable by individuals with disabilities, including individuals who use wheelchairs in that, inter alia, they are equipped with a level-change mechanism or boarding device.  However, on information and belief, three of the five accessible vehicles are more than ten years old and not all of the vehicles are currently, or consistently, in operable condition.

23.    The United States is informed and believes that Starline has instituted a policy of providing accessible vehicles for its demand responsive tours upon forty-eight hours advance notice.  Starline does not require forty-eight hours advance notice for non-accessible vehicles.  Notwithstanding its forty-eight hours notice policy, Starline has, in repeated instances, informed members of the public that accessible vehicles were not available or were available only under extremely limited circumstances, even where reservations were made far in advance.  Likewise, the United States is informed and believes that Starline repeatedly has failed to provide an accessible vehicle for its demand responsive tours despite notice in accordance with its policy.

24.    Starline’s actions constitute a pattern or practice of discrimination or raise an issue of general public importance within the meaning of 42 U.S.C. § 12188(b)(1)(B) and 28 C.F.R. § 36.503.

25.    Upon information and belief, Starline’s actions caused harm to Amy Champlin and her companions, including but not limited to emotional distress, and continue to cause harm to other similarly situated individuals with disabilities.