From Lived Experience to Action: Hendricks County Hosts First Accessibility Summit

- FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -

Contact: Josh Duke, Josh@VisitHendricksCounty.com

DANVILLE, IN (April 9, 2026) – The panel of local authorities and a global professional shared their perspectives on the significance of continuing to improve accessibility. The panelists included a local resident who brought lived experience, an individual who helps people with developmental and cognitive disabilities, another who brought insight on aging and how it impacts everyone over time and a representative who works with destinations around the world to improve inclusive travel.

“If you’ve ever had something feel harder than it should have, figuring out where to enter a building, reading a sign, navigating a website or even trying to follow a conversation in a noisy space, that’s what accessibility is really about,” said Kim Fox, Senior Research and Data Manager for Visit Hendricks County and leader of the CARE to Connect initiative. “It’s not just mobility or physical spaces. It includes vision, hearing, cognitive and developmental differences, aging, temporary injuries and even how people access information online.

“And for many people, it’s not occasional—it’s every day,” she added.

Nearly 100 local businesses, nonprofit leaders and community partners attended the event at the Hendricks County 4-H Fairgrounds and Conference Complex in Danville. The panelists included:

• Courtney Wallace, a local resident who grew up with Spina Bifida and is the co-founder of Access UpRising
• Patti Sebanc, Director of Employment, Youth & Therapeutic Services with Sycamore Services
• Marina Keers, Executive Director of Hendricks County Senior Services
• Andres Villigran with Wheel the World, a global partner of destinations to advance accessibility

The CARE (Community Accessibility, Readiness & Education) to Connect program ties directly to Visit Hendricks County’s Destination Defined: Connecting the Community, Visitors & Residents strategic plan. Destination Defined directed VHC to invest in initiatives that support destination development. This includes identifying infrastructure and programming needs that everyone — regardless of ability — can fully experience Hendricks County.

The Summit comes on the heels of the initiative’s first substantive phase earlier this year, in which Wheel the World conducted accessibility assessments at nine local tourism-based businesses. Each business was recognized during the Summit and is now Accessibility Verified.

Visit Hendricks County invested $17,500, including a $5,000 grant from the Hendricks County Community Foundation's Community Impact Grant Program, to pay for the assessments.

For more information about the CARE to Connect initiative, click here. Click here to review VHC’s full strategic plan. To learn more about current accessibility resources in Hendricks County, click here.

Visit Hendricks County, Inc., enhances tourism and improves residents’ quality of life through leading destination development, fostering industry-community connections and promoting the county through trusted and impartial leadership. For more information, visit our website at VisitHendricksCounty.com or call (317) 718-8750.