Shruti Rajkumar had never partied in D.C. before. She’d just moved to the city in late May and hadn’t familiarized themself with the nightlife scene, including what bars are accessible to people with disabilities. Rajkumar has a physical disability and uses a power chair.

When a friend’s girlfriend suggested that the group go to one of the city’s two self-described dyke bars Saturday night for a birthday celebration, Rajkumar was game. Upon arriving at A League Of Her Own in Adams Morgan, she immediately learned what many people with disabilities and their advocates already know about D.C.: nightlife can be inaccessible. Rajkumar and her friends couldn’t access the dancefloor because of her wheelchair.

Rajkumar says they and her friends tried to enter the bar, which operates out of a basement along 18th Street NW. But security denied entry through that door because of her wheelchair, eventually instructing the group to go through another accessible entrance located at street level. (She shared their experience in a Twitter thread that went viral, and later shared additional details with DCist/WAMU.)

ALOHO, as it’s often called by regulars, shares a 10,000-plus square foot building with a gay sports bar called Pitchers, both owned by Dave Perruzza. Rajkumar and her friends entered the bar through Pitchers, as security instructed — but when Rajkumar’s friends attempted to carry the power chair onto the third-level dance floor, security stopped them, saying only the floor below was accessible to wheelchairs. The group discussed fighting back, but declined, and left soon after that.

“I’ve never experienced that — where someone has denied me entrance because of a mobility device,” she tells DCist/WAMU. “The fact that they told us to leave the entire area like that felt extremely discriminatory. And it was,” they continue.

Three days after the incident, management of ALOHO and Pitchers published an apology on social media, as well as outlined steps they’d take to make the space more inclusive moving forward. “A security guard from our team made decisions based on the safety constraints that we deal with in our space that negatively impacted a patron’s night out. It is clear that our teams actions, lack of training, and poor communication in this situation all lead to this individual having a negative experience,” the apology said.

Issues with accessibility exist across all types of venues, but queer bars in particular often purport to be truly inclusive and welcoming spaces. One in 5 adults in D.C. have a disability, and queer people are more likely than the general population to have a disability. Advocates have tried to make queer bars more accessible to people with disabilities in recent years, but they say they were met with challenges, be they cultural or structural.

Disability advocate Andy Arias says his accessibility work with queer bars in recent years through an initiative at The DC Center For the LGBTQ Community has been largely fruitless. D.C. is “one of the most inaccessible places” he’s lived, he says. When he would go out before the pandemic, he only knew of two queer bars where he could easily enter with his wheelchair: Trade and Town, the latter of which permanently closed. “I don’t matter to these bars and clubs,” he says. “They only care about people that can get into their spaces.”

It’s not just queer bars — many local restaurants fail to provide people with disabilities a dining experience similar to patrons who are able bodied, according to Washington City Paper, even though establishments are required by federal and local law to modify policies and procedures to ensure equal treatment.

ALOHO and Pitchers are not fully compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. For example, not every floor is wheelchair accessible and the bathrooms are on inaccessible floors. But the bar is also exempted because the building is older. Even so, management at the dyke bar has taken responsibility for Rajkumar’s experience.

“We’ve had lots of conversations over the past few days, specifically regarding the situation and how we can start changing some things,” says the bar’s manager of diversity and inclusion, John Marsh.

Rajkumar plans to file an ADA complaint with the DC Office of Human Rights. She is especially concerned for people who, unlike her, always have to use a wheelchair. “They wouldn’t have access. And that’s not inclusive to the entire queer community,” she says. Rajkumar just recently became an ambulatory wheelchair user, having relied on crutches her entire life until they moved to D.C. for an NPR internship.

The Office of Human Rights says Director Hnin Khaing is also weighing whether to proactively investigate the alleged discrimination regardless of any formal complaint. The office had been tagged repeatedly to Rajkumar’s thread on Twitter. “It’s also entirely not ok that bars and restaurants across the District remain so inaccessible,” says one post. A spokesperson says OHR is aware of the criticisms, so has previously launched an education campaign for businesses on how to be more accessible that includes a guidebook on best practices.

Rajkumar says she feels “indifferent” to management’s response. She met with Marsh, and says she believes he has good intentions. “He recognized that harm was done,” she says. “I think I’ve just been in so many of those kinds of conversations. … like just another conversation about accountability and the intent to do better.”

Rajkumar says she didn’t have a particularly pleasant experience speaking with the bar’s owner, Dave Perruzza. “It kind of almost felt like he was placing blame on me,” Rajkumar says of Perruzza, who messaged her on Twitter after the incident. “I’d like to have a discussion with you because honestly we have had plenty of people come in with wheelchairs and haven’t had any issues,” the message read, per screenshots shared with DCist. Perruzza also asked to learn what security said so he could “further educate them,” and offered his work email so Rajkumar could contact him. (Perruzza didn’t respond to a request for comment.)

This isn’t the first time ALOHO and Pitchers have been criticized for allegedly discriminatory behavior. The bar has been accused of catering to white cis people, as is referenced in replies to Rajkumar’s thread. Marsh’s position was created in part a year ago to make the bar more inclusive following these accusations, he tells DCist/WAMU.

The joint queer bar has made strides when it comes to racial diversity, says Marsh, noting the owner doesn’t actively manage the space and the majority of management are people of color, including general manager Barbie Lopez. Both Marsh and Lopez say the bar could generally be more inclusive of other communities.

The bar doesn’t explicitly ban wheelchairs from the dance floor, say Marsh and Lopez. But because the building doesn’t have a ramp or elevator to the third floor, people with mobility aids are effectively shut out. Marsh and Lopez say management does not let staff touch patrons’ wheelchairs for liability reasons, and discourages patrons who are drinking against moving mobility aids upstairs themselves for similar concerns. They also say they’re rethinking the bar’s policies and training, which currently aren’t tailored to the disability community. Marsh is also trying to consult disability groups. But he and Lopez noted structural challenges to making the space more accessible.

“We are a historical block, so I think there’s a lot of restrictions,” Lopez says. “But despite that we want to come up with a reasonable way to resolve some of the issues,” adds Marsh.

Arias says other bar owners have also complained to him about red tape and logistical problems as he’s tried to help them make their spaces more accessible. But he says he was motivated to do something because of the dearth of nightlife options for him and others in his community. He recalls having staff at Cobalt (which is closed) carry him upstairs to access the dancefloor. “I would make them do that a couple of times a night because I figured if they do it enough, they’re going to complain and be like, ‘we really need to figure out a solution for this,’” he says. Nellie’s, meanwhile, didn’t let him access the upstairs’ dance floor with his wheelchair for “liability” reasons, Arias says. (Nellie’s did not respond to a request for comment.)

As You Are in Barracks Row is trying to be the first queer space in the city with a truly accessible dancefloor. Co-owners Coach Pike and Jo McDaniel say they’ve wanted to install an elevator since they opened the dyke space in March. (Their dance floor is upstairs in part due to noise concerns from neighbors.) They anticipate regulatory hurdles, including with the Historic Preservation Review Board and local Advisory Neighborhood Commission, as they move forward with the plan, they tell DCist/WAMU.

Pike and McDaniel shared their accessibility plan on social media following the backlash to Rajkumar’s experience at ALOHO, ensuring patrons that they’re taking feedback and making accessibility changes on an ongoing basis. (Pike and McDaniel used to work at ALOHO.)

“We very much, as business owners, understand the challenges of trying to be inclusive inside of a culture — the American culture, capitalistic culture that isn’t pro-inclusivity,” Pike says. “It is challenging and it does cost. And the hope is if more people and business owners do this and demand that places be inclusive, that the government and the people that fund these things will start also seeing the importance of it.”

Rajkumar offers a tip for businesses who want to be more inclusive: “You can’t just add a ramp. How are you making it inclusive to a lot of other people who are disabled? I know disability is like a very broad term and like people don’t realize how much it encompasses,” she says. “So making sure it’s accessible for blind people, deaf people, hard of hearing people, autistic people, people with diabetes, etcetera. Like it needs to be accessible and you cannot just consider physical accessibility.”