SEPTEMBER 1999

FEATURES

Marshman

IDEALS CAN BE PRACTICED

By Karen E. Olson
Reprinted from the Tallahassee Democrat

As Kim Marshman sees it, Tallahassee property managers may be missing a major market. She was surprised by some of the lukewarm attitudes she encountered in 1997, when she and her husband moved here and started hunting for a rental home. They were willing to make alterations to accommodate Marshman's wheelchair. But their offers weren't greeted with enthusiasm.

"Most people don't see ramps as assets," said Marshman, 33, a Ph.D. candidate in psychology at Florida State University. "They see them as something that's unattractive or a hindrance - when, in fact, they're something that can benefit anybody." Many people need room to maneuver baby strollers, bicycles, walkers, crutches or luggage carts. Or else they have guests who do.

"With our aging population, you're going to have people with joint problems who find it easier to use ramps," Marshman noted. "They're going to find it easier to use lightweight lever handles on sinks and doors. Wide doors give a house an open, airy feeling. They're not ugly - they make it easy to move furniture around."

She solved her housing woes by moving to GIBB Oakridge Village, where she's now the manager.

"It's a great job," she said. "I don't have to travel - I go out my door and I'm almost at my office." The Ross Road complex, run by Goodwill Industries-Big Bend, offers 40 apartments for people with disabilities. It's one of seven in the area. Amenities include front-loading washers and roll-in showers.

"It's not a group home," Marshman emphasized. "These are people who live independently." Since breaking her back in a wreck at age 16, she has found ways to adjust her career goals. "I had had thoughts of doing surgery, but it's not really possible to do that when you're sitting down," Marshman said. "Now, there are standing wheelchairs - but when I had my accident, there weren't such things."

Since earning a master's in social work from FSU in 1988, she has worked with people who have brain or spinal-cord injuries.

"I've had many clients, especially when I was working in inpatient rehab, who couldn't say to me, 'You don't know how it is,'" Marshman said. "So it broke down some barriers that way." She enjoys country drives and writing for professional journals. Except when obstacles appear, she rarely thinks about her wheels.

"You do what you gotta do," she said. "You can let a disability define who you are, or you can be a person who happens to have a disability . . . Just as another person might wear Nikes, I use a Quickie - that's the brand of wheelchair I use."

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