CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM
Justin "Pono" Tokioka, 11, used sign language yesterday in making a statement at the federal courthouse.
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PONY settles with deaf Kauai ballplayer
The baseball league agrees to make changes to its rules
PONY Baseball/Softball Inc. has reached a settlement with a deaf 11-year-old all-star baseball player from Kauai, allowing sign language interpreters in the dugouts.
The baseball league also has agreed to pay $30,000 to the parents of Justin "Pono" Tokioka after the U.S. Justice Department upheld the complaint by the Tokiokas that the league violated the Americans with Disabilities Act.
While the settlement, announced yesterday, affects only PONY leagues, it is expected to be a precedent for future discrimination complaints against youth sports leagues based on disability.
"I feel happy because I helped other kids with disabilities have an interpreter in all sports," Tokioka said through an interpreter.
In July 2005 during a game in Hilo, Pono's father, Jimmy, was kicked out of his son's Lihue All-Star team dugout because PONY rules did not allow sign language interpreters in addition to the maximum three coaches per team.
In the settlement, PONY agreed to:
» Allow and provide sign language interpreters for deaf or hard-of-hearing players during games.
» Change its rules and practices to allow disabled children an equal opportunity to participate.
» Train its board of directors in the requirements of the ADA.
» Name an ADA coordinator to ensure that PONY leagues provide reasonable modifications and auxiliary aids for disabled players.
» Pay Justin Tokioka's parents $30,000 in damages.
Jimmy Tokioka said the family never asked for a monetary settlement. All he and his wife wanted was for PONY to change its rules to allow sign language interpreters and for an apology for what happened in last year's state Mustang tournament of 9- and 10-year-olds in Hilo.
The Tokiokas did not get their apology.
"No, that's why the settlement amount kept going up," he said.
CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM
Justin "Pono" Tokioka, 11, who is deaf, focused on a sign language interpreter at yesterday's news conference at the federal courthouse. The U.S. Justice Department said yesterday that PONY Baseball/Softball Inc. violated the American with Disabilities Act when it refused to let Justin's father, Jimmy, in the dugout as an interpreter at a PONY State Regional tournament game in Hilo last year.
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PONY did not admit any wrongdoing, but the Justice Department found PONY violated the ADA by failing to provide Pono an equal opportunity to participate, failing to make a reasonable modification to its rules and failing to provide an auxiliary aide.
Jimmy Tokioka said his son is diagnosed as profoundly deaf. He has no hearing in his left ear, but can detect some sounds with his right ear thanks to a cochlear implant.
"He (Pono) just needed to understand the motivational strategies the coaches were telling him, the game strategies, and without an interpreter there was no way you could have done that last year," Jimmy Tokioka said.
In last month's state Bronco tournament for 11- and 12-year-olds in Lihue, Pono's mother, Beth Tokioka, was allowed in the dugout as his interpreter while PONY and Justice Department attorneys were still negotiating the settlement.
During pool play against eventual state champion Mililani, Pono batted 1-for-2 and scored a run, but his Lihue All-Stars did not advance.
Until the start of this season, Pono decided he was not going to play baseball this year, his father said, but changed his mind after seeing his teammates.
"We're very, very proud of Pono hanging in there and continuing to play baseball, because if he gave up, all of that would be for nothing and we didn't want to see that," Tokioka said.
