If she can avoid it, Robin Ripple does not go to the state-operated Western New York Developmental Disabilities Services offices in West Seneca.
Beyond all else, she faces a logistical challenge. Ripple, of North Tonawanda, uses a wheelchair. Getting out there demands either finding a ride, or taking a bus that requires two transfers and then shuttling in, which is frustrating enough.
Ripple, 53, was born in Buffalo with cerebral palsy, a developmental disability. As a 3-year-old, in the late 1960s, she was placed by her family in the old West Seneca State School, later renamed the West Seneca Developmental Center, part of a complex that is now used in part for state offices.
