- BahasaAfrikaans Argentina AzÉrbaycanca
á¥áá áá£áá Äesky Ãslenska
áá¶áá¶ááááá à¤à¥à¤à¤à¤£à¥ বাà¦à¦²à¦¾
தமிழ௠à²à²¨à³à²¨à²¡ ภาษาà¹à¸à¸¢
ä¸æ (ç¹é«) ä¸æ (é¦æ¸¯) Bahasa Indonesia
Brasil Brezhoneg CatalÃ
ç®ä½ä¸æ Dansk Deutsch
Dhivehi English English
English Español Esperanto
Estonian Finnish Français
Français Gaeilge Galego
Hrvatski Italiano Îλληνικά
íêµì´ LatvieÅ¡u Lëtzebuergesch
Lietuviu Magyar Malay
Nederlands Norwegian nynorsk Norwegian
Polski Português RomânÄ
Slovenšcina Slovensky Srpski
Svenska Türkçe Tiếng Viá»t
Ù¾Ø§Ø±Ø³Û æ¥æ¬èª ÐÑлгаÑÑки
ÐакедонÑки Ðонгол Ð ÑÑÑкий
СÑпÑки УкÑаÑнÑÑка ×¢×ר×ת
اÙعربÙØ© اÙعربÙØ©
Beranda / Album 730
Tanggal pembuatan / 2013 / Week 29
ADAPT (1000)
20 — ETC ' NOVEMBER 22, 1996, IN THE NEWS Photo by T. Nash: A young man in a manual wheelchair is next to a police officer by a building wall. A small group of other people are in the background between them. Caption reads: ADAPT acts up at the Marriot Title: Disability actions impact gay community by Rob Nixon Atlanta - Forceful, effective street activism is not dead, it's just being conducted from wheelchairs. And the outcome of recent high-profile protests by disabled people will have a direct affect on many lesbians, gay men and people with AIDS, according to leaders in the disabled community. Close to 500 members of the disability rights activist group ADAPT (American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today) came from around the nation to Atlanta, Nov. 2 — 6, marching on Centennial Olympic Park, shutting down Georgia Democratic Party headquarters and traffic on Memorial Drive and disrupting a national convention site. And they left town with commitments from both Pres. Bill Clinton and Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R—Ga.) to introduce and support legislationon home and community-based services. At issue is a system in which the elderly and disabled who depend on Medicaid for their care are forced into nursing homes instead of being allowed to use the coverage to fund services that would allow them to stay at home. ADAPT wants at least an initial 25 percent of public money to go toward providing home care, a proposal strongly challenged by the multi-million-dollar nursing home industry, which stands to lose money if the ADAPT plan is adapted. “Our tax money now goes into putting people into institutions that cost somewhere between $40,000 and $100,000 a year, whereas home and community-based services start as low as $8,000 a year," explains Zan Thomton, community organizer for the federally funded non-profit Disability Action Center based in the Atlanta area and a self-proclaimed “rabble rouser" with ADAPT. As an open lesbian, Thomton also sees the issue as relevant to the gay community. “This was part of Sharon Kowalski's issue, because what her lover, Karen Thompson, was fighting for was to get her into their home and out of the nursing home where [Kowalski's] biological family chose to keep her," Thornton says, refen'ing to the case of the lesbian couple separated in the late 1980s when one of them became severely disabled after an accident. After years of legal battles, Kowalski was finally retumed to Thompson's disability-accessible home. Thomton also says the issue is important for disabled gays who may be forced into nursing homes where they are not wanted and are treated badly. Such problems would be avoidable under the ADAPT plan, says Eleanor Smith, founder and coordinator of Concrete Change, an organization that advocates for disability-accessible housing. “A lot of institutions militate against even heterosexual sex; that's doubly true of gay and lesbian disabled people who want to maintain their erotic and affectional lives," says Smith. “Anti-gay policies and homophobic individuals who have care and control of your immediate life is a scary thing. They can make your life hell, and they do. By receiving vouchers to pay for home care, it's up to you to hire and fire your own help. There are problems with home care, too, but at least you have some choice and control." Smith points out the issue is equally important to people with AIDS who have progressed to the stage where they have functional difficulties and require daily care. “They need and deserve the kind of support that would allow them to be in the place of their choice," Smith says. “Many would choose to use a voucher and stay in their own home." To achieve its goals, ADAPT has functioned over the last 20 years or so similar to ACT UP. The group maintains no official membership or hierarchy, preferring to operate, Smith says, on the basis of “if you do it, you're in it." ADAPT started in Denver with actions that blocked buses to draw attention to the lack of disabled access to public transportation. Such protests eventually led to having access codified in the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). “During the fight for ADA passage, gays and lesbians and disabled people hung together and did not allow themselves to be
ADAPT (1001)
[This page continues the article from Image 1007. Full text available under 1007 for easier reading.]
ADAPT (1002)
[This page continues the article from Image 1007. Full text available on 1007 for easier reading.]
ADAPT (1003)
[This page continues the article from 1007. Full text available under Image 1007 for easier reading.]
ADAPT (1004)
Care options urged by Marlene Karas/Staff Atlanta Journal-Constitution November 5, 1996 Demonstrators (from left) Juliet Myer, Claude Holcomb and Cassie James, who want alternatives to Medicaid policies that limit the care options of people with disabilities, sit in Monday at Clinton/Gore campaign headquarters on Spring Street. About 400 members of Americans With Disabilities For Attendant Programs Today, which is meeting in Atlanta this week, blocked access at 1100 Spring St. for several hours before police broke up the demonstration.
ADAPT (1005)
[This page continues the article from Image 1007. Full text is available under 1007 for easier reading.]
ADAPT (1006)
[This page continues the article from Image 1007. Full text is available under Image 1007 for easier reading.]
ADAPT (1007)
ADAPTING ATLANTA What do you get when the American Health Care Association, AHCA, convention coincides with the Federal election in the backyard of the Congressional district of the Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich? One of the best national ADAPT actions in history! Election time in Atlanta, the city which had just hosted both the Olympic Games and the Paralympic games international disability conference could not have been a better choice. November 3 through the 6, 1996 five hundred ADAPT activists marched on Atlanta to continue our battle to free our people from nursing homes and other institutions and get a national attendant services program. Commitments from the Speaker, a call from Airforce One pledging a meeting with the President and the chance to give the nursing home industry a taste of its own medicine were among the victories won at this historic occasion. This time it was the Speaker's people who called ADAPT asking for a meeting. Realizing ADAPT was not only not going away but actually was about to be in his face, his staff set up a meeting to negotiate ADAPT's demand that Gingrich sponsor a national attendant services bill. In hard hitting negotiations, ADAPT representatives from each state were able to hammer out an agreement hand written by Gingrich himself and signed by both him and Mike Auberger. ATLANTA The statistics may be faceless numbers, but at the vigil we remembered together. Photo: Tom Olin As these negotiations were taking place the other 470 ADAPT members marched down International Blvd. to the plaza in Centennial Olympic Park to hold a press conference and rally. At the press conference ADAPT announced we were filing a human rights complaint with the United Nations regarding the United States’ national policy of institutional warehousing for people with disabilities. Michigan ADAPT organizer Marva Ways read the resolution indicting the United States while ADAPT members, holding candles, looked on. Emotions ran high as the crowd, in memory of friends and family who have died in nursing homes, planted flags in the grassy hillside along the plaza. Just as the ceremonies were ending the Gingrich negotiators rejoined the big group to announce our successful talks. These powerful memories, this call for justice and the hope of a real solution were the perfect start for the actions of the next few days. Fed up with the Clinton administration's lip service on changing the focus of the nation's long term care, ADAPT was ready for bear on the second day. Since before the start of 1996 this administration had been acting like an advertising firm for the nursing home industry. Although some Medicaid policy had been changed, the focus and the funding bias remained in favor of the nursing home industry. Given opportunity after opportunity to call for a reform and redirection in support of community services, Clinton and his people refused to take that chance, and instead clung to the wretched status quo. Letters and calls to try and set up meetings had been ignored. The eve of the presidential election proved to be an excellent backdrop for our message, enough to get even Clinton's attention. Taking the light rail is some trick, when you are traveling with 500 people. But, it’s a trick ADAPT has become quite adept at over the years. So November 4th ADAPT set out for the office visit. It took only minutes to fill the lobby of the building which housed, on its second and eighth floors, the Democratic state headquarters and the state Clinton-Gore headquarters. It seemed to take hours to get folks upstairs. Though the elevators were slow, a steady stream of ADAPT activists flowed to the floors above, until both were packed. Our wheelchairs and bodies clogged the halls as our chants echoed down them. On the eighth floor the Democratic Party chair was in a huff, refusing to discuss ADAPT's demands. On the second floor staff were trying their best to divert us. Slowly the police began to appear, claiming the owner of the building wanted us arrested and removed. Obviously the idea of hauling hundreds of us off was a little daunting, but even the cops could not make Mr. 8th-floor-hot-shot negotiate. Back on the second floor ADAPTs crack team of negotiators was taking control. As their cohorts were being arrested and literally hauled off one by one, Day Leaders Faye Bonner, Marva Ways and Mike Oxford systematically worked their way up the chain of command within the White House. It was sickening to hear our alleged "friend" Carol Rasco offering a meeting with some junior White House advisors the week after the election. Did they really think we were that stupid’? ADAPTs intelligence forces we at work during these negotiations, and leaks in the opposition's communications made it clear that sad as their offers were, even more sad was the fact that they did not intend to keep the promises they were offering. Faye, Marva, and Mike refused to back down. At one point cops started to haul off Marva, when suddenly the tone changed. Meanwhile down at the jail house the holding cells just got fuller and fuller and fuller. Guards began lining us up against the hall walls as our numbers totally over-whelmed the facility. The whole scene took on the air of a Fellini movie as we joked and waited to see what fate was to befall us. People just kept pouring in. Faye Bonner, with her Arkansas connections knew that the President planned to be flying to a party that evening so she demanded the White House call Airforce One. That was impossible. That was impossible. Then suddenly, Special Assistant to the President Alexis Herman was flying in from Montgomery to negotiate. Unlike those before her, Herman was apparently negotiating in good faith. She listened to our concerns and agreed to set up a meeting with the President in the first quarter of 1997, and even gave a letter of commitment. In jail the final count was 86 arrested. About 11:00 pm a judge came in and presided over our arraignment hearings in a holding cell. Like sausages squeezed out in a factory line, one by one all 86 of us were processed through the system and out into the cold night. Back at the hotel, a charming establishment, all the restaurant and bar staff had gone on strike. So we ordered 43 pizzas, took advantage of the lack of crowds and empty tables and celebrated the victories of the first two days. Just one target was left unaddressed. It had been a late night, so we started out later than usual. This time we were taking the ADAPT vans so we started shuttling way across town to the Georgia Nursing Home Association. It took hours, and despite jittery nerves, some false alarms and threats from a nearby gas station owner, we were able to wait undetected for hours until the whole gang was together. Once assembled we lost no time in marching down the highway to the Association's headquarters and surrounding the building. We had it shut down in minutes, and began tapping on the windows and door, calling for Fred Watson the Association's Executive Director to come and meet with us. To no one's surprise, Fred was downtown, partying it up with his AHCA buddies. Before long the police joined us, and overhead we saw their helicopter circling. Since Fred refused to come back to the office, negotiations came to a standstill. More and more police cars arrived and tried to pen us in by parking across the driveway to the parking lot. Our response? In one quick move we had taken the highway in front of the building. In the end we were four lines deep, handcuffed together and stretched across all four lanes. There were so many of us, though, that even with this formidable blockade we were easily able to keep the building as the afternoon wore on. The media were also there in force and began to prepare for their live-at-five stories. Finally, although Fred refused to show concern for his staff inside, we let them out the back door at quitting time. Fed up with Fred, the police finally gave him some kind of ultimatum, and by six o'clock he returned to negotiate with a delegation of Georgia ADAPT folk. GA ADAPT asked for his support for their state version of CASA, the Long Term Care Bill (check name), but he regurgitated the same pap his kind always spits out: we support community based services but we can't put anything in writing or get any more specific for you. After a couple of attempts to get anything real out of the louse it was clear further talk was useless, Pat Puckett announced the results of their talks, namely nothing except head patting and lip service. It was a dark and stormy night. No really, it was wet and cold and not yet the end of a long day -- with the nearest bathroom a hike away -- but ADAPT's troops held firm. We had simply to think of our brothers and sisters in nursing homes. They had no choice of who and where they would spend another night They had little to make them comfortable. They also probably were waiting to go to the bathroom, or be changed. Their bodies might not be cold, but how warm were their hearts and souls with potentially years of warehouse living stretching out into their futures? ATLANTA (Continued from page 9) If the enemy would not address our concerns seriously at the GA Nursing Home Association, we would have to go to them. Lined up in twos down the highway, our numbers stretched on and on. Even to the weary and jaded among us it was an awesome sight! On signal we moved out to the MARTA light rail station about a half mile down the highway. On route we passed the buses that waited to take us to jail. (One thing ADAPT has learned is how to get a paratransit vehicle to do all the things they never can do otherwise: be on time, wait patiently and without interrupting their riders, riders who have not subscribed or even reserved a trip in advance.) By the time the middle of the line had reached the MARTA station things were flowing alarmingly smoothly. Color leaders were stationed along the route to direct the flow, one poor standing soul per elevator was riding up and down, up and down to ensure maximum efficiency loading and button pushing. Even the police and metro staff were helping the more foolhardy or brave ride down and up (at the other end) the escalators. As he steadied a power chair user for the ride back up out of the subway one cop said "l don't approve, but this sure is moving fast and easy..." The other end of our journey was back in downtown Atlanta. Once all had arrived at our rendezvous point we made a hasty march for the AHCA hotel, this time the fancified Marriott Marquis! As ADAPT's luck would have it, the hotel had hired two off duty officers to guard the hotel for the whole week of the AHCA convention. But both had gone to "lunch" at 11:00 pm when we arrived. We could not understand how we were able to saunter right into the lobby but we did not waste time pondering this puzzle. We just zipped on inside. You talk about glitzy! Red plush this and gleaming chrome that. Crystal dangling from here and mirrors sparkling from there. Best of all: the thirty-plus-story-high open atrium in the center of the building. ADAPTs motley troops massed at the bottom of the atrium, hand-cuffed ourselves together and took up our freedom chants. The echo worked its way up the atrium almost as fast as it worked our adrenaline through our veins. Finally we had another opportunity to confront the nursing home operators inside their hedonistic nest of creature comforts. Looking down on us from the mezzanine level one floor above, AHCA party-goers were slack jawed. Looking around at the opulence, ADAPT members’ jaws grew tight as we thought of the contrast with the dirty white walls, the bars, the lock-wards and urine stench of the nursing "homes" which had funded this gala event. One man came down to scold us, but after moments of talking with a few of us he found his way back upstairs to try and find AHCA Executive Director Paul Willging for us. But Willging was in hiding and did not show his face. Everything seemed to be held in limbo as our chanting went on and on. No one from the hotel approached us. Police were quite slow to appear. Meanwhile, AHCA continued to stare down from on high. After a while some among us grew restless and started to wriggle their way up a set of escalators that had been turned off on our arrival. Once on the mezzanine level they engaged those around them in conversation, explaining why we were here and what we wanted. Threateningly, an AHCA member several floors above tried to drop a cocktail glass on one of our people. The glass missed her and shattered, severely cut a man who was talking with her. The police made the AHCA conventioneers leave the atrium area, and soon began the arrests. City buses were lined up in the circular drive in front of the hotel and busload by busload we were hauled off. lt was almost six in the morning before the last of the crowd was taken away. When the last of the 110 of us were taken into the holding area, we had jam packed the space and were filling the halls outside. There was no hope for the militarized order jailers are so determined to maintain. Within a few short hours our lawyers, valiant volunteers that they are, were preparing us for court and we were being herded in bunches to a small room filled with inaccessible benches so we could appear before the judge. About noon the last of the batches had been processed, and everyone was brought back to the hotel for some much needed sleep. That night another historic ADAPT soiree took place. After a wrap up meeting and a buffet supper, DJ Leonard Roscoe, himself an escapee from a nursing home, had us rocking and rolling in the huge meeting room. A male stripper helped one wheelchair warrior and some of her friends celebrate her birthday. Outside a smaller group was singing freedom songs hootenanny style. intense private conversations, political debates and whoops of laughter punctuated the party as our folks from across the country enjoyed our last few hours together. ln the morning we would start the daunting job of piling on planes which would mess up our chairs, or cramming into vans which would carry many of us literally for days back across the nation to our own communities where we carry on the fight -- sometimes alone -- on the home front. <<<<<<<<<<<<< Some very special ADAPT people treated AHCA ’s partiers to a special bedtime story and lullaby. The lobby, open to the top of the hotel, echoed and echoed with the angry chants of ADAPT ‘s night owls on the prowl. Photo: Tom Olin
ADAPT (1008)
Atlanta Journal-Consititution November 4, 1996 RALLYING FOR LIFE missing picture id Marlene Karas, Staff Activist Justin Dark of Washington leads a rally of disabled people down International Boulevard Sunday. Participants, in town for a conference, want programs to help disabled people live at home. Then, they say, fewer would demand the right to die. Article,page B1.
ADAPT (1009)
This is part 2 of a story in ADAPT 1013, 1012, 1011, 1010 and 1009. The entire text appears in ADAPT 1013 for easier reading. Photo by Cante Tinza, Inc: Between two gleaming metal walls of elevators ADAPT protesters fill all the available space. Facing in all directions waiting for elevators, the group is packed together. Caption reads: ADAPT filled the lobby and several floors of Cigna. We don't want managed care to manage us out of the picture.
ADAPT (1010)
This is part of a story in ADAPT 1013, 1012, 1011, 1010 and 1009. The entire text appears in ADAPT 1013 for easier reading. Photo by Carolyn Long: Three women in straw cowboy hats stand in a line arms around each other grinning. Caption reads: Free at last, Donna Redfern, Kathleen Sacco and Marita Heyden finally came out of jail. Bill Henning and Mike Butte were released earlier that day.
ADAPT (1011)
This is part of a story in ADAPT 1013, 1012, 1011, 1010 and 1009. The entire text appears in ADAPT 1013 for easier reading. Photo by Cante Tinza, Inc.: Protesters are standing and sitting jammed in by the front of a building. Their mouths are open yelling, one person has a bullhorn and several have their arms raised in the air. Caption reads: Outside the Republican Headquarters ADAPT cheered upon hearing the party chairman had arrived and agreed to our demands.
ADAPT (1012)
This is part 2 of a story in ADAPT 1013, 1012, 1011, 1010 and 1009. The entire text appears in ADAPT 1013 for easier reading. The photo here: Photo by Cante Tinza Inc.: A tight shot of a crowd of ADAPT protesters in front of Living Centers of America glass building. Folks look hit and one woman is holding a poster over her head that reads: I'd rather go to jail than die in a nursing home!! Caption reads: Barbara Hines, AJ and tons of others gave Living Centers of America a does of their own medicine when their office was turned into a nursing home for the day.
ADAPT (1013)
Incitement [This picture contains an article and the "ADAPTed" lyrics to a song. The article text continues in ADAPT 1012, 1011, 1010 and 1009, but is included here in it's entirety for easier reading. The lyrics appear here after the complete article.] Photo: A man (Cisneros) and woman (Julian) sit with heads bowed writing on pads in their laps. At their feet a woman (Searle) sits on the floor her arm extended, speaking forcefully. Behind her Three guys in wheelchairs sit in front of a mostly obscured crowd. One other wheelchair user is visible between HUD Secretary Cisneros and Deputy Sec. Julian listen as Jean Searle tells it like it is! Norbert _______, Alfredo Juarez, Jose Lara and Sean Pevsner watch the fireworks. Photo: Holly G Gearhart [Subheading] DEEP IN THE HEART OF TEXAS THE EYES OF TEXAS ARE UPON YOU! Five hundred strong ADAPT took on the third largest city in the United States, Houston Texas, which is home to the third largest nursing home corporation in the nation, Living Centers of America, LCA. As if anticipating ADAPT’s impact, Houston had record high temperatures of over 95 degrees each day. But ADAPT’s stalwart troops withstood the melting temperatures for one of the hottest actions yet! Action started Monday morning as wave after wave of wheelchair warriors reached the front door of Living Centers of America. Transporting these record numbers was quite a trick, especially since Houston’s traffic is known for bumper to bumper log jams on the maze of highways which crisscross its 596 square mile face. Living Centers of Americas corporate headquarters stand alone on the feeder road of IH-10. As if built for defense, this industry giant is surrounded by flat grassy fields, impossible to approach undetected. Clearly everyone could not gather before we entered the building, so speed was of the essence for the first arrivals. Unloading with efficiency learned from experience, the leadership team and first arrivals rushed through the front doors and the lobby. Building security began to realize something funny was going on. As they insisted we sign-in the guest register, we piled in the elevators and headed up to the eighth floor to find LCA corporate mogul Edward Kuntz and his cohorts. Photo by Cante Tinza Inc.: A tight shot of a crowd of ADAPT protesters in front of Living Centers of America glass building. Folks look hit and one woman is holding a poster over her head that reads: I'd rather go to jail than die in a nursing home!! Caption reads: Barbara Hines, AJ and tons of others gave Living Centers of America a does of their own medicine when their office was turned into a nursing home for the day. Last year, in Texas alone, Living Centers amassed $39.28 million in revenues after allowable expenses, according to state human services department cost reports. Nationally, LCA increased their net revenues $185 million, 26%, from 1994 to 1995. Over 50% of their revenues come from Medicaid and other public funds. And 100% came from the lives of people like you and me who do not have a fair choice to stay at home and with attendant services. Insert footnote: When reporting this to the public, ADAPT of TX used to use the term profits, but the Texas nursing home industry threatened to sue us if we used that term. FYI The American Heritage Dictionary defines profits as "the return received on a business undertaking after costs have been met." Your guess at the difference is as good as ours. [back to article] Kuntz and his top level cronies personally pulled in over $2 million in salaries and perques in 1994. This cozy financial package allows Kuntz’s family to live in a genteel little village on the outskirts of Houston. On another much less prosperous edge of Houston, over 200 kids with disabilities are kept on the second floor of the "Thomas Care Center" one of Living Centers’ nursing homes. Fenced in with barbed wire, some do not even leave the grounds to go to school. This is just one of the 209 nursing homes with over 24,000 beds which help pay for the comforts of Kuntz, his staff, board and shareholders. The second wave of ADAPT’s activists went to deliver some barbed wire to Kuntz’s home (since it was apparently good for the kids at Thomas Care Center we figured his family deserved the same protection) but found that -- learning of our plan in advance -- the family had moved down the road a ways. Helpfully, a neighbor phoned the Kuntzes with the unpleasant news of our attempted visit. [Subheading] MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE OFFICE Back at the eighth floor of corporate headquarters, the first arrivals headed into the offices to seek out Kuntz. Doors were locked in our faces and one man pulled a sofa across a hallway to block our passage. However, it was obvious our message had already penetrated the office. ADAPT’s chants rang through their halls, and downstairs van-load after van-load of ADAPTers kept pouring into the building, packing the lobby. Houston police, apparently unable to arrest people in wheelchairs, tried to negotiate, Kuntz hid for the first few hours, but as the building owner grew more and more tense, Kuntz was forced to respond. ln paternalistic frustration police arrested five people who could walk (some with disabilities that were not visible ones.) Negotiations progressed at a snail’s pace, while the police dragged hundreds of ADAPT members out of the building. In the end, Kuntz agreed to meet with representatives from each of the ADAPT `groups` that had come to Houston. The police delivered him outside, where he read a typed, prepared statement of the same old tired lines AHCA folks always use. Then he scurried back inside. << Photo by Cante Tinza, Inc.: Protesters are standing and sitting jammed in by the front of a building. Their mouths are open yelling, one person has a bullhorn and several have their arms raised in the air. Caption reads: Outside the Republican Headquarters ADAPT cheered upon hearing the party chairman had arrived and agreed to our demands. [Back to article] [Subheading] BACK TO THE BEGINNING The Houston event started Sunday with a day of workshops and a Housing Forum with HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros. The workshops were an excellent exchange of information on everything from promoting state versions of CASA (the Community Attendant Services Act, ADAPT’s draft legislation) back home, to developing real housing opportunities for people with disabilities. Justin Dart welcomed ADAPT and Cisneros to his old stomping grounds: Texas. At the forum Cisneros seemed to pick up on many housing issues and was supportive of "visitability" (adaptive or universal design offering basic access so people can visit family, friends, etc.) in addition to better alternatives and more consumer control. However, he was either unwilling or unable to see the problem with HUD sponsoring finance packages for nursing homes and other institutions. In fact he referred to nursing homes as a housing opportunity for older Americans, and seemed to think because people were older they would somehow require such "housing." Clearly, the Secretary’s understanding of disability discrimination is superficial -- at best. More education will be necessary. [Subheading] WE’RE HERE, WE’RE THERE, WE’RE EVERYWHERE Tuesday dawned with the same blistering heat as before. But ADAPT activists were as fired-up as ever to tackle the day’s targets. With over 500 people we could again divide and hit two places in one day, thereby reinforcing our message to the target, namely the leadership of the party in power, the Republican party. Speaker Gingrich and his cohorts still had not lived up to his promises to introduce CASA and include its principles in Medicaid reform proposals. Despite its adherence to the professed Republican values, the party generally has ignored the benefits of CASA: supporting family values, cost effectiveness and getting government out of people's lives. Photo by Carolyn Long: Three women in straw cowboy hats stand in a line arms around each other grinning. Caption reads: Free at last, Donna Redfern, Kathleen Sacco and Marita Heyden finally came out of jail. Bill Henning and Mike Butte were released earlier that day. [Back to article] Half of ADAPT headed for the Harris County Republican Party, and half for the district office of Tom Delay, the US House of Representatives’ Majority Whip (they guy who lines up the votes in favor of the Contract on America). [Subheading] NO ACCESS TO THE REPUBLICAN AND DOLE ELECTION HEADQUARTERS The two actions worked like a charm. ADAPT surrounded the converted gray house where the Harris County Republican Party Headquarters are located. Ironically, this inaccessible building was also the Presidential Campaign headquarters for Dole, who sells himself as the "disability candidate." After quite a wait staff finally located Gary Polland, Chairperson of the Harris County Republicans. In the meantime, ADAPT folks sang the staff numerous versus of "Deep in the Heart of Texas," ADAPT style (see below) When Polland arrived he was very receptive to our demands. He understood that our reform proposal CASA, met many of the Republicans’ goals, and that choice of services was the way to go. He faxed the letters to Dole, Gingrich, Delay and others regarding our concerns and promoting support of our CASA. He also spontaneously offered to have ADAPT representatives present our proposed Party Platform language to the Texas Republican Party Platform Committee when they met to prepare for the state Convention. [Subheading] DON’T DELAY, DELAY All of the 200 crack ADAPT troops who went to Representative Delay’s office managed to get inside the building unhindered, and most made it up to the second floor where Delay had his office. ADAPT’s negotiators were tough, at one point wadding into a ball a draft statement Delay’s staff offered and throwing it back across the table at them. After intense lengthy negotiations, Delay produced a letter committing that he would meet with ADAPT. [Subheading] FREE AT LAST Around midnight that night the last of the five arrested and jailed the first day were released to a rowdy welcoming home crowd of ADAPTers. [Subheading] DAVID AND GOLIATH On Wednesday ADAPT went all together to confront the potentially largest and most heinous enemy of long term care. This menace, lurking just on the horizon, is corporate managed care; this time in the form of one of the industry giants -- Cigna. Although police had spotted us gathering in a nearby empty parking lot, as van load after van load of activists unloaded, they could not stop us as we began to roll. Cigna is one of the biggest insurers handling managed care, a real mover and shaker in the health care arena. As both private and public health care systems move closer and closer toward the managed care model, many problems are surfacing for people with disabilities who have health care needs. Not least among these are the needs for long term care. Long term care is not considered as profitable as acute health care and therefore is less desirable to the managed care corporations. They tend to try and "cream" the most profitable services and ignore the rest. Marching in the front doors, we headed for the elevators to the 12th floor. Leaders demanded to see the CEO as ADAPTers kept filling offices after office and hall after hall. Once the 12th floor was packed, people went for the 11th and 13th floors, and still the lobby remained full of chanting protesters. We took building security and occupants by complete surprise. Working upstairs, a mother of a child with a disability heard the protest and came down to thank ADAPT for lighting for her son. "I worry about him having to go to a nursing home someday. It’s a frightening thought!" she said, and she is right. After some masterful negotiations upstairs and several rounds of ADAPT’s "Deep in the Heart of Texas" from those downstairs in the lobby, Cigna’s Houston CEO Richard Todd, came down to read their letter agreeing to meet with ADAPT to discuss our concerns. The air rang with cheers for ADAPT’s third day of victories. The building chief of security said to one of the day leaders that he was not too happy with our tactics, but the protester pointed out to him that training like this would have cost him over $1,000 a day, yet we had given it for free. The security chief looked amazed, but admitted with a grin it was true! Photo by Cante Tinza, Inc: Between two gleaming metal walls of elevators ADAPT protesters fill all the available space. Facing in all directions waiting for elevators, the group is packed together. Caption reads: ADAPT filled the lobby and several floors of Cigna. We don't want managed care to manage us out of the picture. [back to article] [Subheading] HAVE NO FEAR, ADAPT IS HERE With the largest numbers we have ever had, ADAPT was tested in our ability to work as a team. Each local group had worked hard and in almost every case was able to bring more activists than ever before. Many new faces and many new places were among us. Our people were tested in our faith in one another, and learned the strength we can harness when that faith is kept. Despite some wrinkles, we bested the tests of heat, lack of elevators and transportation. People put up with half hour long waits to get down from the hotel rooms to the staging area, inaccessible vans with make-shift ramps, long cross-city trips on Houston’s traffic-jammed highways, police targeting walking protesters, and record high temperatures and humidity. We put up with these hassles to get across a message, FREE OUR PEOPLE. Acting together ADAPT, once again, was a force to be reckoned with. ADAPT’s message was sent to as many players as possible: day one to the private corporations who seek tremendous profits from the current warped system, day two to the political forces which could effect change but don’t, and day three to those who seek to control the system as it moves to "public- private partnerships." Next stop ATLANTA! [The end of this article] Lyrics Deep in the Heart of TX (song to the tune of Deep in the Heart of Texas) We take no crap Cause we're ADAPT CHORUS: Deep in the Heart of Texas Nursing homes stink They're worse than you think Deep in the Heart of Texas Politicians lie We all know why Deep in the Heart of Texas We'll put a cowboy boot Up the ass of Newt Deep in the Heart of Texas But have no fear ADAPT is here Deep in the Heart of Texas It is my place To get in your face Deep in the Heart of Texas You will be trapped Cause we're ADAPT Deep in the Heart of Texas We want CASA new We don't care how Deep in the Heart of Texas We're making a plea To just be free Deep in the Heart of Texas Rather live in my home Not a nursing home Deep in the Heart of Texas So just be sure What we stand for Deep in the Heart of Texas We take no crap Cause we're ADAPT Deep in the heart of Texas - lyrics by Zak Zakarewsky
ADAPT (1014)
[This page continues the article from Image 1017. Full text is available on 1017]