Gary Stephen Corcoran

An Irish wake and celebration of life for Gary Corcoran, long-time Phoenix accessibility advocate, will be held Thursday Feb. 4 at 5 p.m. at Rosie McCaffrey’s, 906 Camelback Road. Gary died Dec. 20 after a brief illness. He was 64.

No one loved a challenge more than Gary, a retired auditor for the Arizona Department of Revenue, whether it was a Fortune 500 company’s books, a video poker machine or a game of pool. An industrial accident put him in a wheelchair at age 19 but never put him down. He went skiing, sky diving and scuba diving. He traveled the world and was about to board a ship for Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, when he was diagnosed with late-stage pancreatic cancer.

Gary spent thousands of hours volunteering on city and county commissions to make the Phoenix area more accessible to all residents in terms of housing, public transit, air travel and public arenas.

“Phoenix lost a great champion and friend,” Mayor Greg Stanton said of his passing. “Gary served in innumerable leadership positions for the people of Phoenix. He was a particularly passionate advocate for people living with disabilities … Our city needs more citizen leaders like Gary.”

Most of all, Gary was a kind and generous man who loved his family.

“Everyone knows how generous Gary was. He always did things for us. But for me it was more than his generosity, it was the conversation,” said nephew Ken Malin, who noted that he and Gary often engaged in another of Gary’s favorite pastimes _ debate. Sports, football, politics. He would take on any topic. “It was fun, competitive. We enjoyed it,” Ken said.

Gary Stephen Corcoran was born Oct. 10, 1951, in Elyria, Ohio, the second of six children to James E. and Katherine (nee Baroody) Corcoran. He graduated from Elyria High School in 1970 and went to work after school. He also became a pool shark like his grandfather, Abe Baroody, and began to sweep local tournaments.

Just shy of his 20th birthday, Gary was working in a factory stacking metal boxes with a forklift, when suddenly they fell on him. He often described the moment when he lay on the floor of the warehouse, not being able to move his legs, with no one around. He said he knew he had to choose whether to live or die. He chose to live, pulling himself along the floor by his elbows as he yelled for help.

That same resolve propelled him through life. He relearned to drive and to play pool sitting down. He earned an associates degree in accounting at Lorain County Community College.

In 1979, Gary moved to Tempe, Arizona, tired of battling the ice and snow of Ohio to get around. He went to work for the Arizona Department of Revenue as a tax auditor in 1986, traveling to company headquarters around the country for weeks at a time to review their books.

Extensive travel and time on airlines got Gary into advocacy. He had too many bad experiences with transfers into airplane seats and rules that required him to check his wheelchair and endure long waits to exit the plane. Gary volunteered with airlines, then complying with the Air Carrier Access Act of 1986, to train personnel how to do safe transfers for wheelchair users. He also worked on improving accessibility at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.

Gary went on to chair the Phoenix Mayor's Commission on Disability Issues, and was a member of the Phoenix Transit 2000 Steering Committee, Light Rail Accessibility Committee, City of Phoenix Citizen Transit Commission, and City of Phoenix Design Advisory Board, among others. He represented the Disability Awareness Committee of the Phoenix Sister Cities program on a peer-to peer exchange trip to Grenoble, France, in 2004.

Gary worked to secure funding to increase bus and para-transit service and the reach of Dial-a-Ride, and helped oversee the design and construction of the Phoenix Light Rail to make sure cars and stations were accessible. He helped to boost the percentage of accessible apartments along the light rail line from 2 to 6 percent and to establish the Arizona Statewide Independent Living Council.

Gary also served as advisor to the City of Phoenix on the accessibility design and construction of the Talking Stick Resort Arena and to Maricopa County on Chase Field. He also was on the accessibility oversight committees for US Airways Center and Dodge Theatre.

He won countless awards and commendations, including the 2006 Mayor’s Award in the Ability Counts Community Awards Program and the Spirit of ABIL award.

San Francisco Chronicle Editorial Page Editor John Diaz wrote in a 1997 column that Gary constantly maneuvered barriers that others don’t see, always with grace: “(Gary) does not regard himself as an activist … He rarely goes to protest rallies, despite his strong views about accessibility. He's too busy. His preferred tactic for advancing the disabled-rights cause is to do what he wants to do and thus force the travel and recreation industries to tend to their business of accommodating customers.”

Gary loved numbers and beating the odds. Whatever he took on, he did it to the fullest. He was always the most prepared and practiced hard at the things he loved. He put a pool table in his living room to prepare for the Silver Spokes tournaments among pool players who use wheelchairs. He won many championships, including placing first with his partner in the wheelchair division of the 1993 National Pocket Billiards Association U.S. Team Open in Las Vegas.

“Whether it was the committees or auditing or pool, he looked at things like a game, and he wanted to win. He wanted to know more than the person he was going up against … he wanted to know the best statistical move,” nephew Ken Malin said.

After hitting his peak at pool, Gary went on to other challenges, leaving his home pool table to pile up with papers and reports from his community work. At various times in his life, he learned gourmet cooking, wine collecting and took on physical challenges like scuba and sky diving. He wanted to show the world that there was nothing disabled about a person using a wheelchair.

“He got to do everything he wanted,” said mother Katherine Corcoran, “except for one thing.”

As the grandson of an Irish immigrant, Gary obtained his Irish passport. In 2011 he traveled to England with the intention of seeing his ancestral homeland. But his wheelchair didn’t fit into the cars of the train to Wales, where he was to board the ferry to Ireland. They would be made accessible a year later for the 2012 London Summer Olympics, but for Gary it was too late.

His remains will be sent to Ireland to fulfill his wish.

Gary is survived by his mother, Katherine Corcoran, brother Dan Corcoran and sisters Carole, Kathy and Patti Corcoran and Sadakne Baroudi; nephew Ken Malin, and nieces Amiee Johnson, Lisa Diaz and Cheyenne Corcoran.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made in Gary’s name to the following:

1. Ability 360 (formerly known as ABIL (Arizona Bridge to Independent Living)

5025 East Washington Street Suite 200, Phoenix, AZ 85034

Online http://www.ability360.org

2. Hospice of the Valley

1510 East Flower Street, Phoenix, AZ 85014

Online https://m.hov.org

3. Assistance Dog Institute, a division of the Bergin University of Canine Studies.

Bergin University of Canine Studies

5860 Labath Avenue

Rohnert Park CA 94928

Online http://www.berginu.edu/donate.htmlcommunity volunteer and