capacity as the interim director of the louisiana state museum there isn't a first issue that we presented to your others has to do with the fact that the district judge awarded damages in this title to a da case against a public entity but it did so without there being any finding of intentional discrimination when we talk about it is first since his jurisdiction was satisfied that the rap system was used as no one has said that the damages are moot because the damages are his original effort to try to get in the door but then we notice right i mean is this injunction and i know you're addressing the question that's fine but if that has to do with forward looking injunction declared to relieve the damages or backward looking he was denied access the day he showed up because they didn't have the ramps imposers and all of that well that's fine if you want to if you should go to that and then i'll circle back to th and forward looking stuff with all due respect what would your honour's be ordering if in fact you found that it was not moot at the time you're going to grant the request that it be ordered that these rats be put in place and in effect the rhapsode are to be let's read up is there evidence in the road so i assume that the parties agree correct me if i'm wrong that the eighty a violation here is the lack of ramps and buzzer and signage that that was a reasonable accommodation that addressed those three you so that's in the record before me yesterday you give me a record citation while you're looking for the the citations i have here are two photographs at page sixteen thirty three i'm looking at them sixteen thirty four sixteen thirty five sixteen thirty six and what i see there are photographs of doorways with signs and a buzzer but i don't see any raps so i guess my question is if you're and i understand it maybe both sides agree on this but if you're asserting that the case the injunctive in declared her belief is moot on appeal because the accommodation has been least one could find that it went up five hundred dollars is not that much but it was the indignity of not being able to do something because of your disability is i think certainly worth five hundred dollars so the question then is you're saying they had a did you raise the point that you're making to us here the argument you're making did you make those to the district court issue your honor was an additional issue that's not addressed here because the court does address it in his reasons rowlings what with this the sidewalk that we're talking about isn't owned by the state museum it's a city site so there was a legitimate issue as to what could or could not be done on someone else's property the judge does address that in his findings of fact and reasonable so basically there's these  what was there were wraps that the shopkeepers ari had all five of these occasions what was also there were the shopkeepers in their employees able to assist anyone if there who difficulties with the right a the end of the day after all this and all of these allegations what the court found to be a reason or held to be a reasonable accommodation was simply just a better version of that with a portable ramps and some signs  requirement because you can't necessarily as a public entity know in existing on the time when you're building something that's a whole different thing but we're talking about stuff that's old sometimes going back to the seven hundred you can't always know how that inter s with people's disabilities and what isn't isn't needed and what isn't isn't reasonable you can't always know that prospectively so i think that's the concern that once it's raised you need to deal with it and then your point is they made such an and the case is that there has to be some judicial him promise your own the requirement now my question is live at the end of the trial the judge said i'm going to keep this income up with an agreement to do that until friday before monday so why isn't bad enough trial there was an offer a promise made by your clients to provide a remedy and not simply a promise your honor but evidence submitted a trial that was already on well right but look i mean it wasn't status conference to determine the cause of the delay so that sounds like a little bit ambivalent about whether the remedy was actually provided the time of trial or not was he wrong about that and so that comes back to my question about where is the evidence that it's been done and we have some photographs and but you and you say this you're going agreement so i asked the other side if there's an agreement that it's all been repeated and maybe that makes a difference at what was ordered and put in place and there's been policy and in this case there was never any sort of formal announcement of an official change to government to all of policy instead what we had was an attorney showing up on the day of trial and he had a receipt from an moot now because now they have whatever they said or didn't say or testify or didn't testify now the ramps and buzzers and signs and all that are there and the issue is that this case is not a simple purchase a ramp and you're done because under the american disabilities act this gets into providing an ongoing accommodation and so the remedy is not actually the installation of the physical ram instead they are portable rams that are located inside the store fronts there is buzzer so that those portable rants can be out and installed and signage is their answer my question about whether one of the photos do show any ramps and that's exactly why because they are located in time and in so saying that this claim is moot is not accurate because there's going to be an ongoing component not near the mere sation of any legal conduct it's actually requiring the state museum to be committed to conducting this remedy going into the future and we've seen that the state museum has and it's you know pretty much a hostility towards providing this with evidence and he would up a buzzer and i have a ramp in a closet but when the wheelchair person shows up and pushes the buzzer no one responds or somebody responds they say they don't have a about the ramp they don't know how to bring it out they don't know what to do sorry have a nice day then that would not be compliance and so you're saying that justifying the ramps and all of that doesn't answer what you needed the declaratory relief for and the injunctive relief or because you need to force them to actually pull out the ramps and respond to the buzzer when the disabled person shows up it gets a little nuance because the ramps are currently in the possession of the tenant but there's an on going component for the state museum itself because you know these ramps and these buses and signage they're located along a essentially a shopping center located the french quarter we all know the french courts a very rambunctious place you know signage can get torn down ramps can become defective and so there's going to me need to be this moot issue is an injunction to say going forward you've got to maintain control of your tenants to make sure that they are in fact keeping these ramps in working order have employees that know how to pull them out people that are responding to buzzard's making sure the signs aren't torn down at mardi gras or whatever that's your argument exactly and there's numerous components involved this is not merely us you know install ramp and you're done it has to be done in it in the proper m ordered them to install signage and rams ordered them to to have a policy with their tenant this occurred at the last second where these oem you know this receipt which came in a you know unexpectedly over our objection at the trial you know if there must be a formal announcement of a change to official government policy we've seen no such formal announcement of a change to official governmental policy here and in fact we can see at the state museum still doesn't believe that there is really an issue and if you look at even their brief on four times they say that these are perceived violations five times they call them in their opening brief alleged barriers these are not alleged barriers a district court found that they exist and the district court also found that the only reason the state  cases where they did find it what because i've just seen where they announce that you say we're not going to do this anymore and that seem to be good enough so what you're making it sound like they're asked to be something kind of signed in blood and posted in the  courthouse square and i'm just wondering what what you're looking for that we would say that's good enough here and i think it operates along the spectrum like many things in the law on one thing and you know you have you know removal of a offending policy and saying we're not going to do it again on the other end of the specter of course we think is their conduct and in our briefing you know we had some examples of other eighty eight cases one was a case involving it was out of d c where they had a reno and they publicly official duty officials wear out an affidavit or something like that or i don't i don't recall you know but but that's alternately what comes down to is is you know i think something under oath or you know saying that we're actually going to do this more than just an attorney standing up on the day of court and saying you know your claim is moot on that basis i mean we just in an adversarial system here in the lawn and people shout the opportunity to challenge their opponent to make sure that what they're saying is i i mean i don't know that this will bear upon the ultimate outcome of the case i have a real problem with all of these criticisms of the district court that were not raised with the district court you didn't have it they you saying no intent you're saying well this wasn't enough of a policy change enough of an announcement and we were also confused you have the time to come in appeal to us and you don't have the time to go and raise this with the court with the trial court i can just tell you that doesn't sit well with me it may not make a difference here because technically you may not have had to raise it but i would tell you if you actually care about representing your client and actually care about making changes that would benefit people with disabilities then go to the district court first not us first so i would say i know permanently that what form of barrier to traffic control that was one of the issues with the ultimately with installation of permanent fixed ramps was that it would impede traffic flow and that's way counter man's your attorneys he argument because if you're saying we didn't actually achieve anything in the trial court really got a big nothing burger they got some ramps in the closet matt said and how can you get attorney's fees well that gets into the first you know what standard if we're going to hold the government liable for damages what sort of notice to they have to have then in one nine hundred eighty five there was just supreme court of alexander v cohen and alexander because it said that the guardian's case that intentional discrimination is not appropriate for the rehabilitation act at the rehabilitation act goes beyond intentional discrimination based on handicapped and in fact prohibits failing to provide meaningful access to individuals with disabilities and it's mr be preston as well but i believe that all three of these cases can be harmonized because what's a little pile is saying in that case was that it involved a very specific individual i circumstance or one individual was interacting with another individual police officer with a hearing impaired individual and he needed an accommodation for his hearing but ultimately there are different types of claims under the americans with disabilities in the act in the rehabilitation there are those sort of individualized need for accommodation you know one person interacting with a police officer there's no overall policy issue there's no we all practice cities there's no physical barrier it's discriminating against everyone with a disability and so that's where the deal with the court sent him to lay in a pile is is not necessarily in conflict with kelly and alexander because ultimately that dealt the very specific factual circumstances of one individual interacting with another so if you were telling a court to instruct a jury on the intent requirement to  overall practice of discrimination overall barrier that's discriminating against everyone it's not that there's no intent in such a policy that barrier itself is discriminatory and so saying to you so that's how you get the injunction if they didn't go out and buy  nobody's debating that the question is do you get damages and there you have the problem that i articulated new orleans is a good example of a city full of really old buildings and they were built a long time before the resent a kind of a da we're not talking about new buildings which is a wholly different category what do you do about these old buildings that have these weird steps and these cobble stones and all of this kind of stuff and you don't want to take away from the beauty of new orleans and its roots and all these centuries old buildings and that is the area in which if you're going to get damages the argument is you need to show intent that there really intentionally discriminating in some form or fashion what's wrong with that analysis and i just me what's wrong with that analysis and is that  its under the meaningful access standard that i was just articulating for the alexander case it's not that any time you go up to an old building you'd be able to recover damages it would come down to whether they had taken steps to meaningfully provide access so if they've done places the four of the five facilities where they were service ramps are used for you know hauling goods in and out these are not accessible the ramps that were in place and so the point is that the under the meaningful access standard it's not that at any place you could sue is that if they've done something to provide meaningful access to the general public then you wouldn't be able just to go up and say you know look i'm going to recover damages and c but if they've done literally nothing which one we discriminated against i don't believe that there is any sort of notice requirement it gets into the question of more of the intentional discrimination versus since this case from alexander veto it and that's where many other circuits have moved the alexander vetoing case because that does provide died in sin and understanding that when you've done nothing that's not providing meaningful access but if you've done if you've taken steps in the right direction then that is generally you know making meaningful access for this facility and then you would not be able to see for damages so it's not a he thought the ranch you had out there whether you meant them to be for a da or not were good no you're just kind of stupid instead of nasty then why should that you'll damages in a world where we have a case that says you need intent should there at least be something more than negligence or stupidity or just ignorance if you will of what it takes for a person in a that the purpose of these acts was to prevent more than just intentional discrimination it's also to prevent discrimination that occurs from the collective again i think the injunctive relief here makes a lot of sense the question is just recovering damages because again you've got a whole city full of opportunities for people get damages if you if you set a very low standard for what it is that you have to get because it's a city full of old buildings and so on and so forth so i understand the judge really completely but putting that aside damages relief why should that be based upon somebody's ignorance of just i thought the rains were bad enough and i found out that no you know a wheelchair can't navigate that i found out because of your client's careful insightful statements on that now that i know i'm fixing that fine why isn't that enough to avoid damages because at this point it's been twenty eight years since the passage of the americans with disabilities act and what we get into is that this is a situation where the defense have done nothing and that's really what it comes down to is that it's not about if they've done if they've done something that would you know don't raise a question but when you've done nothing what was the what he said nothing so on and i see that i don't have time but i do believe that what the court was inquiring to earlier that the defendant didn't even actually raise the issue of intention discrimination and therefore it really can be addressed without getting into these thorny intentional discrimination issues building that have been there since the seventy's hundreds as your honor said centuries before there were even considerations and what historic preservation has to do with is what reasonable efforts can be made because the intersection between historic preservation and need for eighty a combination which you don't have and like a new field insurance his like building that's just a few years old and if we're not dealing with you know i have a brand new building a new government building we're dealing with the thing that to i don't want to ask for help well you have the reps that are already there you have the people inside available to help but the at the end of the day after all of this what was agreed to be