County commissioner for the interests of people with disabilities

In today's society, many people are increasingly focused on their own needs, which means that the more vulnerable members of the community are often overlooked or inadequately supported. Another significant factor is the demographic trend: many family members are getting older and there is a lack of knowledge about the correct use of aids such as wheelchairs, especially among relatives who could take on a supportive role in care.

To start early, I usually organize wheelchair days for 4th grade students before the schools separate. At this age, children are still carefree and often see such activities as an exciting and entertaining challenge. The aim of this activity is to teach the pupils in a fun way what it feels like to be dependent on aids and to show them how they can support others - such as their parents, grandparents or even strangers in everyday life - if necessary.

A central element of this event is that the children go through different stations in pairs and alternate perspectives: one time they sit in a wheelchair and experience what it is like to be dependent on help, and another time they are in the role of the helper and learn what responsibility they take on when they support someone. These changes of perspective promote empathy and understanding and usually lead to a significant improvement in the children's social behavior.

Through this experience, the children develop a greater awareness of the needs of others and are better prepared to take on responsibility in the future and to deal sensitively with people who are dependent on aids.

If you are interested in the awareness-raising project or have any further questions, please feel free to contact me. Thank you for your interest.

Participation must no longer be hindered by a disabled parking space. "I just need to get something quickly" or "Nobody needs it anyway" are excuses often used by drivers when they use a disabled parking space without permission.

The fact that there are people who absolutely need a wide parking space close to the entrance is ignored. This need is also growing with an ageing yet mobile society.

Only with additional disabled parking spaces and the pure use by the authorized group of people can the participation of disabled people be ensured.

The district commissioner Mr. Seifert and the working group for people with disabilities would like to draw people's attention to this issue. They therefore organized a joint campaign week together with the district of Miesbach (05.05-11.05.22). However, the campaign is intended to extend beyond the events during the week, which is why two videos were made and information cards developed.

Furthermore, a flyer was developed to raise awareness of what each individual can do to enable fair parking. It contains information for the following people with and without disabilities:

• Car drivers
• Holders of a blue parking permit
• as observer
• as municipal traffic monitoring
• as police

as well as the possibility of simplified removal of parking offenders without the presence of police officers ("simplified towing").

The information cards can be stuck under the windshield wipers of future "wrong-way parkers" to raise awareness of the issue.

How do you get the flyer and the information cards so that you can distribute them? There are various options here:

• You are writing to Teilhabe@lra-toelz.de 
• or call the Inclusion Planning & Design Office of the Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen District Office.
• A PDF file for printing is attached at the end of this article
• The flyers and information cards are also available in the town halls of the towns and municipalities

You can find more information on the topic, the campaign and the videos in the following newspaper article.

• GelbesBlatt: Disability commissioner calls for "fair parking" for more participation in public life 
• Merkur: Disability commissioner calls for "fair parking" for more participation in public life
• Merkur: Disabled parking spaces in the Tölzer Land: Film promotes consideration 
• Merkur: Miesbach "Fair Parking" campaign emphasizes the importance of disabled parking spaces
• Süddeutsche Zeitung: Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen: Let's talk about wrong and right parking

The two videos are published on the YouTube channel of the Working Group for People with Disabilities and can be shared or linked.

As in other districts, there are also car-sharing banks in the Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen district.

These benches are prominently placed in the participating municipalities. You can indicate where you would like to be taken on a sign next to them. Of course, you can also discuss your exact destination with the driver.

By sitting on the ride-sharing bench, people passing by recognize that you would like a lift. The bench offers the opportunity to get to your destination outside of local public transport.
Please note that the ride on the carpooling bench is not specially insured.

An overview table of the benches installed to date can be found in the following table:

As the name suggests, the aim of the "awareness kit" is to create more understanding for people with disabilities in order to improve awareness of existing barriers and help break them down. With the materials and information contained in the kit, users can gain their own experience of how individual impairments affect their actions. From individual experiences to cooperative games, cognitive and physical impairments as well as sensory impairments can be experienced. For example, you can use a Lorm glove to experience how deaf-blind people communicate using the Lorm alphabet or move around using glasses with various visual impairments and a cane, and much more.

The idea of the awareness kit has already been successfully tested in other districts. For the district of Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen, a special version was put together by the office for inclusion design of the district office in collaboration with its representative for people with disabilities, Ralph Seifert.

Both (pre-)school and extracurricular groups can borrow the awareness case free of charge from the district administration's media center.