Wapato family with autistic son pushes for statewide alert system

Raising an autistic child can be challenging and fretful. Just ask Theresa and Darren King, whose son was once found in an irrigation ditch after wandering away from home.

After that experience, the Wapato, Washington, couple worried about the potential for other events, such as a house fire or medical crisis. How would emergency responders know they were dealing with an autistic child?

The couple painted a blue jigsaw puzzle piece – a symbol of the complexity and mystery of autism – on their mailbox as a way to alert authorities that an autistic child lived there who was likely to run off and had trouble communicating.

The Kings made sure the local fire department was aware of their son, but it’s not known how many other responders would have understood the symbol. Now, proposed legislation would make sure a similar symbol becomes well-known.

Lawmakers in Olympia are considering a bill to create an alert system named for Travis King, the boy who wandered from home. The bill would establish a statewide standard for reflective symbols to be placed on cars and homes to alert police, firefighters and medical responders that they are going to be dealing with someone with a disability, and it sets up a system where dispatchers can relay information to responders. The bill also calls for training emergency responders how to work with people who have disabilities.

House Bill 2287, sponsored by Rep. Gina McCabe, R-Goldendale, had its first hearing this month and is awaiting a vote in the House Judiciary Committee to move it to the full House of Representatives for consideration. McCabe said the bill has bipartisan support.

If it passes, McCabe and Theresa King said, it will be the first of its kind in the nation.

“I’ve had people say, ‘We can’t believe this is not already in place,’” King said.

In April 2015, Darren King painted a blue jigsaw puzzle piece on their mailbox, as part of Autism Awareness Month and to alert emergency responders that there was an autistic child in the home. King asked McCabe if there could be legislation designating the image as an alert.

After King wrote about the bill for the Toppenish Review-Independent, McCabe said she started hearing from others asking if a similar alert system could be developed for people with Down syndrome, Alzheimer’s disease or other disabilities.

That’s when McCabe, with King’s support, expanded the Travis Alert idea to cover all disabilities, and changed the symbol’s color from blue to orange.

Displaying the sticker, as well as sharing information about the disability with 911 call centers, would be strictly voluntary.