LAKE BUENA VISTA — Jamie Santillo, of Adventures By Jamie, specializes in planning trips for people with disabilities. She says there’s an uproar in the disabled community about changes to Disney’s DAS pass system.
“Right now I’m hearing a lot of, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to do Disney again’ and that makes me so sad,” she said.
DAS stands for Disability Access Service and was designed to give options for those who have medically legitimate reasons that make it too difficult to wait in traditional lines.
But starting this week Disney has stricter guidelines to get those DAS passes.
Disney says the passes are only for “guests who, due to a developmental disability like autism or similar, are unable to wait in a conventional queue for an extended period of time.”
“I feel like they are trying to generate a happy medium between people who have abused DAS pass in the past and people who really truly need it,” said Santillo.
Jamie, who has muscular dystrophy, was denied a DAS pass under the new guidelines.
She says she agrees that just being in a wheelchair isn’t reason enough to get the pass, but she also has a heart condition.
She’s never been denied the DAS pass before.
“If I am overheated my heart does all kinds of fun things and I’m not trying to be shocked by my defibrillator.”
After going through a virtual video meeting Disney approved a pass for Jessica Silber's son who has autism.
Silber says Disney has played a big role in his development.
“He started talking to characters at Disney before he started having meaningful conversations with other people. It’s been a highlight for him. It’s his happy place,” said Silber.
Those with the DAS pass don’t go straight to the front of the line.
They are given a time to return to rides, then put in the Lighting Lane, which others can pay to have access to.
“Every kid needs to learn to wait. Absolutely, my son has autism. We are teaching him to learn to wait in a line. It just takes him a lot longer. And when we use the DAS pass we are still waiting the same amount of time. We are just not waiting in a physical queue line,” said Silber.
Disney says requests for DAS passes have tripled over the past five years and those found trying to cheat the system could face a lifetime ban from the park.
