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ACCESS Committee Members

Michelle Albert – Boeing Commercial Airplanes – Seattle, WA – Michelle Albert is a Technical Fellow from Boeing specializing in airplane cabin safety.  Ms. Albert has been a member of European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) rule making activities and is also a member of the Cabin Safety Working Group (CSWG), which supports the International Coordinating Council of Aerospace Industry Associations (ICCAIA).  She is very knowledgeable in all aspects of airplane interior certification and cabin safety.  She also has a broad experience within interiors of all Boeing airplane models. Her experience also includes extensive coordination with numerous foreign regulatory agencies in support of Type Certification Validations.

Zainab Alkebsi – National Association of the Deaf  (NAD) – Washington, DC – Zainab Alkebsi , who grew up deaf, serves as Policy Counsel for the NAD and is responsible for providing analysis, recommendations, and counsel to the NAD on policy issues affecting deaf, hard of hearing, and deafblind people. Her work encompasses advocacy on issues such as Video Relay Services, Internet and television captioning, and accessible travel.  She received her J.D. from the University of Baltimore School of Law.  She also has a B.A. in Political Science from University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC).

Mary Barnicle – United Airlines – Chicago, IL – Mary Barnicle is the managing director of regulatory affairs at United Airlines.  She has worked for over 15 years in international and regulatory positions at United.  Ms. Barnicle’s responsibilities cover both policy and compliance with economic and consumer-facing regulations.  Ms. Barnicle directly manages a team that monitors the company’s compliance with consumer-facing regulations.

Kelly Buckland – National Council on Independent Living (NCIL) – Washington, DC – Kelly Buckland is the Executive Director at NCIL.  Kelly Buckland is a person with a disability who has been actively involved in disability issues since 1979.  Kelly started his career as an employee for Idaho’s Protection and Advocacy system.  He served for over twenty years as the Executive Director of the Boise CIL, Living Independence Network Corp. and the Idaho SILC.  He has served on the Idaho Developmental Disabilities Council, the State Employment and Training Council, and the State Help America Vote Act Steering Committee.  He has worked on issues affecting people with disabilities, including passage of the Personal Assistance Services Act and the Fathers and Mothers Independently Living with their Youth (FAMILY) Child Custody Laws.

Michael Childers – Airline Passenger Experience Association (APEX) and Lufthansa Systems Americas, Inc. – Kansas City, MO – Michael Childers is a long-time content management consultant in the nontheatrical motion picture and entertainment industry. He is a member of APEX’ Board of Directors and is chair of its Technology Committee that creates content delivery specifications for inflight entertainment (IFE). In 2014 he was given the IFE industry’s Outstanding Contribution Award for leadership in the development of digital content delivery specifications. He is currently Chief Consultant, Content and Media Strategy, for the Frankfurt-based IT company, Lufthansa Systems.

Curtis Decker – National Disability Rights Network (NDRN) – Washington, DC – Curt Decker is the Executive Director of the National Disability Rights Network (NDRN).  He has been affiliated with NDRN since its inception in 1982. Mr. Decker oversees all activities related to training and technical assistance, membership services, and legislative advocacy. Before founding NDRN, Mr. Decker served as Director of the Maryland Protection and Advocacy (P&A) and the Maryland Disability Law Center (MDLC). He was also a member of the original Air Carrier Access Act Negotiated Rule Committee after the passage of the Act in 1986.  He was also involved in the negotiation, passage, and implementation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act.

Parnell Diggs – National Federation of the Blind – Baltimore, MD – Parnell Diggs serves as Director of Government Affairs for the National Federation of the Blind.  Parnell is blind and is a frequent customer of many airlines and airports. He is familiar with the types of accessibility issues faced by passengers with disabilities.  He is a licensed attorney admitted to practice in South Carolina since 1997.

Paul Doell – National Air Carrier Association (NACA) – Arlington, VA – Paul Doell has fifteen years of aviation policy experience working with Capitol Hill, the Department of Transportation, the Transportation Security Administration, and the Department of State.  He will have complete access to NACA’s member carrier experts related to these important issues.

Geoff Freed – National Center for Accessible Media at WGBH (NCAM) – Boston, MA - Geoff Freed serves as NCAM Director of Technology Projects and Web Media Standards.  Mr. Freed has helped develop techniques for making Web sites accessible; he has contributed to federal and local accessibility guidelines, policies and regulations; he has developed techniques and software for providing captions online, and he has co-authored TTML, a markup language for the distribution of captions over IP, an achievement recently recognized with a Technical Emmy.  Mr. Freed has led federal grants to study the accessibility of mobile devices as well as the distribution of captions and descriptions to those devices.  Mr. Freed has a thorough understanding of accessibility and multimedia standards as well as accessible user-interface design, and has trained hundreds of people in the art of making Web sites and multimedia of all kinds as accessible as possible.

Brian Friedman – JetBlue Airways – Long Island City, NY – Brian Friedman serves as Director, Litigation & Regulatory Counsel at JetBlue.  A critical component of his responsibilities in this role is Air Carrier Access Act compliance.  He joined JetBlue as Manager, Staff Counsel in 2009.  He also currently serves on the Executive Committee of the American Bar Association Forum on Air & Space Law as the Vice Chair, Budget.

Lise Hamlin – Hearing Loss Association of America – Bethesda, MD – Lise Hamlin is the Director of Public Policy for HLAA. She herself has a hearing loss, has worked as an advocate for people with hearing loss for some 20 years, representing HLAA in the last eight years on federal advisory committees, industry advisory groups, and consumer coalitions and works on a number of public policy issues, including transportation, employment, technology, and access to telecommunications. She has also been part of negotiations with industry representatives.  She worked with the movie industry on a consensus agreement regarding the U.S. Department of Justice Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (FNPRM) on movie captioning.  She also worked with the cell phone industry to negotiate a consensus proposal on hearing aid compatible phones for an NPRM issued by the FCC. She was graduated with a B.A. from City College of New York.

Dr. Katharine Hunter-Zaworski – Oregon State University – Corvallis, OR – Dr. Hunter-Zaworski is an Associate Professor at Oregon State University’s School of Civil and Construction Engineering.  Dr. Hunter-Zaworski has over 35 years of experience in accessible transportation, and is a nationally and internationally recognized expert in the area of accessible public transportation.  She has academic qualifications as both a rehabilitation and transportation engineer and she has been focused on accessible transportation since 1981.  In 1991 she served on the USDOT Federal Advisory Committee on Narrow Bodied Aircraft Accessibility. It was during this advisory committee deliberation that many of the issues related to single aisle aircraft accessible lavatories were discussed.  Dr. Hunter-Zaworski provided technical assistance to the Boeing Aircraft Company on the design of accessible aircraft lavatories including the new the Boeing 787 Dreamliner accessible lavatory. Most recently, she has worked with the Boeing and industrial partners on the design of an accessible lavatory for the single aisle B737 aircraft.

Candace Kolander – Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) – Washington, DC – Candace Kolander is the Coordinator of the International AFA Air Safety, Health and Security Department.  She conducts initial, intermediate and accident investigation training for AFA’s committee members and chairpersons, and provides continuing guidance to them as necessary.  Ms. Kolander serves as an International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) representative on the ICAO Cabin Safety Group.  Ms. Kolander also serves on the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Air Carrier Training Aviation Rulemaking Committee (ACT ARC).

Doug Lavin – International Air Transport Association (IATA) – Washington, DC – Doug Lavin represents the interests of IATA’s 260 member airlines in Washington, D.C. on all issues impacting those carriers.  Doug has served in that capacity for the past 11 years, prior to which he was Assistant Administrator for International Aviation at the FAA.  Doug has been actively involved with DOT on both passenger rights and disability rights issues during this Administration.  His experience allows him to make decisions on behalf of his membership in terms of the Negotiated Rulemaking proceeding and reach out effectively and efficiently to IATA’s global membership to get their input on the issues before the Committee.

Lorne Mackenzie – WestJet – Calgary, Alberta, Canada – Lorne Mackenzie has represented WestJet’s position with respect to all matters related to persons with disabilities since he joined the company in August of 2004. His responsibilities include:  representing WestJet at all accessibility-related government consultations for policy and legislative development; representing WestJet in all accessibility-related formal and informal complaint responses; and participating on behalf of WestJet in all accessibility-related legal proceedings as a subject matter expert. Mr. Mackenzie has over 22 years of aviation experience in almost all operational facets, from Airport operations to exposure to Inflight and Flight Operations, ground or ramp operations and customer relations.

David Martin – Delta – Atlanta, GA – David Martin, in his role as Program Manager - DOT Compliance, is the corporate policy owner for issues related to disability and services provided to passengers with disabilities. He is the subject matter expert on the Air Carrier Access Act related to the areas in discussion having participated intimately in consent order proceedings, and roll-out of regulation changes since 2002. He supports all customer-facing business units to ensure that procedures are consistent with regulation and corporate policy. He has been involved in the discussions about service animals since the changes appeared in the 2008 revision of 14 CFR Part 382 and has conducted station audits to comply with the elements of the ACAA since 2012. David has partnered with the departments responsible to implement the onboard entertainment systems, advocating for accessibility long before it was an issue in Washington. He also partners with Aircraft Interior Engineering so he will be positioned to provide feedback on the issues related to Accessible Lavatories on single aisle aircraft.

Orit H. Michiel – Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) – Orit Michiel is MPAA’s Vice President of Legal Affairs.  Her responsibilities include legal, legislative, and policy work for MPAA.  For many years she has worked with the MPAA’s members regarding the technical, cost, and passenger satisfaction issues relating to IFE and closed captioning.  She has been dealing with closed captioning issues on behalf of MPAA and its member companies for over a decade, including review by the Department of Justice of closed captioning issues in motion picture theaters.  Based on this work with the MPAA member companies’ representatives in the business and legal sectors in connection with various IFE issues, she has developed an understanding of the actual and potential cost impact to the MPAA member companies in relation to captioning of IFE content, including different versions and formats of content and the display of that content

Bradley W. Morris – Psychiatric Service Dog Partners (PSDP) – Rock Hill, SC – Brad Morris currently serves as the Director of Government Relations for PSDP. His approach to advocacy is largely shaped by his academic background and a strong desire to find creative solutions that respect all stakeholders’ reasonable considerations. After double-majoring in Psychology with honors in Philosophy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Mr. Morris earned MA and CPhil degrees in analytic philosophy from the University of California, Davis. At UC Davis, he won awards both teaching critical reasoning and symbolic logic and instituting peer instructor training and mentoring programs. He has been wearing many hats as part of PSDP since its inception in 2012, and was involved with a similar service animal user organization for many years before then. Through a decade of experience, reflection, and topical collaboration with his spouse and many other service animal users, Mr. Morris is familiar with the access challenges and day-to-day minutiae of life with a service animal..

Lawrence Mullins – Counsel Lufthansa Group, The Americas – East Meadow, NY – Larry Mullins has been heavily involved with the Department’s disability regulation (14 CFR Part 382) since its application to carriers within the Lufthansa Group (Lufthansa, Lufthansa Cityline, Eurowings, Austrian and Swiss). He has developed and implemented training programs addressing regulatory and compliance changes related to Department of Transportation regulations, including 14 CFR Part 382. Mr. Mullins was also selected to participate in a DOT focus group related to the issue of “Wheelchair and Guide Assistance at Airports and on Aircraft.”

Lee Page – Paralyzed Veterans of America  (PVA) – Washington, DC – Lee Page joined the Advocacy Program of the Paralyzed Veterans of America in 1990. In his role as Senior Associate Director, he works to ensure the rights of people with disabilities by advocating for the removal of regulatory and discriminatory barriers, through interaction with the Congress, the Administration, Federal agencies, other disability organizations, private business, and the general public.   He did extensive work to ensure the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the ADA Amendments Act, the National Voter Registration Act, and the Help America Vote Act.

Deborah Lynn Price – Frontier Airlines – Denver, CO –Deborah Price is the Vice President of Customer Experience at Frontier Airlines.  Prior to that, she was Vice President of Continental Airlines’ Houston, TX hub.  Ms. Price also held finance-related positions with Continental Airlines, Braniff Airlines and Compaq Computer.  She has an MBA in Finance from the University of St. Thomas, and a BA in Accounting from Stephen F. Austin State University.

Roser Roca-Toha – Airbus – Herndon, VA – Roser Roca-Toha holds the position of Aircraft Interiors Marketing Manager. In this role, Ms. Roca-Toha is in charge of cabin marketing activities, for North America and Latin America.  She works closely with Airbus operators in the Americas in order to understand airline cabin needs and operations, promote Airbus’ cabin product offering, share Airbus’ vision for cabin trends, and represent Airbus in industry-level aircraft interiors forums.  Prior to that, she held the position of A350 Customer Programme Manager at Airbus Central Entity, in Toulouse, France. In this role, she worked with A350 customers, facilitating their aircraft cabin customization decisions, from sales campaign up to aircraft delivery.  She joined Airbus in 2006 in the avionics systems engineering division, where she led a team responsible for the development of new satellite communications and connectivity systems.  She holds a Master’s Degree in Telecommunications Systems Engineering.

Alicia Smith – National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) – Arlington, VA – Alicia Smith is a long-time NAMI member who lives with serious mental health conditions. Ms. Smith is well-known for her expertise on service dogs and emotional support animals and uses her knowledge to advocate for appropriate policies and practices. She is a Board Member of NAMI Montana and an active member of its Legislative Advocacy Team. She is the only person with a mental health condition on the Advisory Board of the Center for Mental Health Research & Recovery (CMHRR) at Montana State University. She is also a trained teacher of multiple NAMI programs, including Peer-to-Peer, a peer-led education course for people living with mental illness, a state trainer of NAMI Smarts for Advocacy and a trained facilitator for NAMI Connection Recovery Group, a support group for people living with mental health conditions.

Jenine Stanley – Guide Dog Foundation for the Blind and America's VetDogs – Smithtown, NY – Jenine Stanley serves as Consumer Relations Coordinator at the Guide Dog Foundation for the Blind and America's VetDogs.  She has also served as part of Guide Dog Foundation for the Blind’s board of directors from 2003 to 2008, and was part of the formation of America’s VetDogs to serve veterans with disabilities. Ms. Stanley’s role within the Consumer Services Office includes assisting graduates and supporting agencies regarding civil rights laws at all levels, advocacy, and policy development concerning assistance dogs.  She has also served as President of Guide Dog Users, Inc. (GDUI) from 1996 to 2000, during which time she oversaw the legal proceedings against the state of Hawaii that allowed quarantine exemptions for people with guide dogs.

Anthony Stephens – American Council of the Blind (ACB) – Alexandria, VA – Anthony Stephens is the Director of Advocacy & Governmental Affairs for the American Council of the Blind.  Mr. Stephens is well versed on both critical issues faced in the field of transportation and access, and also very familiar with the regulatory and rule making process.  In addition to his work at ACB, Mr. Stephens also is a member of the WMATA Accessibility Advisory Committee (AAC) and sits on the Board of Directors for the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities, the nation's largest coalition of disability organizations.  He sits on the Board of Directors for the Aid Association for the Blind, a local grant-making organization focused on empowering community nonprofits.  He also has used guide dogs for the past 22 years, and has an academic background in advanced telecommunication systems.  He holds an M.A. in mass communication and A.B. in journalism from the University of Georgia, and also has a Certificate in Business Management from George Mason University.

Jennifer Sunderman – Regional Airline Association (RAA) – Washington, DC – Jennifer Sunderman joined the Regional Airline Association (RAA) as Director of Operations, Safety & Technical Services in February 2015.  She serves as the association’s primary liaison to the Inflight, Human Resources, Ground Safety and Maintenance committees.  Her committee work largely focuses on operational best practices, policy issues, and general industry conversation.  Jennifer participated in the DOT’s disability training modules kick-off meeting in December 2015 and coordinated the engagement of regional airline SMEs for each of the initiative’s subsequent focus groups. Prior to joining the RAA, Jennifer provided contract support to the FAA’s Air Traffic Organization Performance and Analysis division for three years and was employed by Atlantic Southeast Airlines / ExpressJet Airlines for seven years as manager of Operational Performance.

Blane A. Workie, U.S. Department of Transportation (Designated Federal Officer)