By Carl Winfield

Michael Harris is looking for a job. But he already spends his days working.
Harris spent just over six months as an administrative aide to Assembly Member Micah Kellner (D-Manhattan). Since leaving in December, the disabled commuter activist has been meeting with officials across the city to discuss wheelchair accessibility throughout the city’s public transportation options. In his off-time, he has been planning a vacation to Los Angeles—though even that will include some work, with a planned informal survey of that city’s public transportation system.
This is the kind of energy and devotion that have already gotten him noticed among the leaders of the city’s disabled, including City Disabilities Commissioner Matthew Sapolin.
“Michael is a shot of new blood for the movement,” Sapolin said.
The bubbly 24-year-old was born with a neurological disorder that limits his movement, though he has no trouble quickly weaving his red, motorized wheelchair through the tables at a Midtown diner while speaking in depth about his continuing efforts to get the Taxi and Limousine Commission to invest in a fleet of wheelchair-accessible Toyota Siennas.
He stopped talking only to check his Blackberry.
“I’m kind of a gadget guy,” he said, running his finger along the trackball.
While a senior at Manhattanville College in Purchase, New York, Harris became frustrated with the difficulties of getting into the city from campus. In response, he started the Disabled Riders Coalition as a senior project for his government class.
The movement quickly attracted attention.
“What really started as trying to get myself a route off campus transformed into a larger thing,” Harris said.
He attended one press conference Mayor Michael Bloomberg and other elected officials held to address the effects of token booth closings on disabled riders. Though he was impressed that they were speaking out on behalf of the disabled, he noticed that he was the only disabled person there.
“I looked around the room and said to myself: ‘Where are all the riders with disabilities to say it for themselves?’” he said.
Harris began organizing press conferences, writing letters and doing his own research on transportation accessibility.
That volunteer work caught the eye of Kellner, who won a special election for an East Side Assembly seat last June. A disabled advocate himself, Kellner soon hired Harris as an administrative aide—all that the budget allowed—but encouraged him to help craft policy on disabled issues as well.
Kellner said this was a logical fit.
“When people think about straphangers, they think of Gene Russianoff. When people think about disabled riders, they’re going to think about Michael,” Kellner said.
Initially, Harris balanced his role as executive director of the Disabled Riders’ Coalition and his job in Kellner’s office. But he eventually found himself wanting to do more—and get paid more—than the position in Kellner’s office could provide.
“I was able to work on some policy issues,” Harris said, “but at the end of the day, it was a part-time position.”
Living with his parents in Bayside, Brooklyn, Harris supports himself with his savings as he looks for a new job. He is interviewing with several local elected officials he said, hoping to land something in communications or policy by the middle of March.
As for what might come after that, Harris said, he is still unsure. But elected life is appealing.
“My City Council member is term limited out in 2009. Would I run for my Councilman’s seat in 2009? Probably not. Might I in eight years?” he said. “Quite possibly.”