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Нүүр хуудас / Цомог / Nashville, fall 1993 Opryland 45
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[Headline] ADAPT's good cause deserves calm debate There is a tremendous difference between getting attention and getting results. Americans Disabled for Attendant Programs Today, or ADAPT, received plenty of attention last week. Whether that attention translates to results will depend in large part on whether the group focuses in the future more on its message than on its manner. ADAPT's message is that this nation's health care system is skewed too heavily toward nursing home care. It argues that many people with disabilities who could live independently at home are forced into nursing homes because home health care isn't adequately funded. It specifically asks that 25% of the nation's Medic-aid money be funneled into home health care instead of nursing homes. ADAPT's basic premise is sound. While its demand for a particular figure of 25% of Medicaid money is debatable, there is little debate that a new focus on in-home-care, not just for people with disabilities but for many other people who have long-term illnesses, would stretch health care dollars and increase quality of life. But last week, ADAPT's manner over-shadowed its message. ADAPT brought its crusade to Nash-vile last week because the American Health Care Association, a lobbying group for the nursing home industry, was holding a convention at the Opryland Hotel. On Sunday, an ADAPT demonstration blocked the entrance to the Opryland Hotel for nearly two hours. On Monday, ADAPT members lined the halls of the state Capitol, demanding to meet with Gov. Ned McWherter, who was in Germany. [Subheading] Group should make its pitch to government! On Tuesday, when a meeting between ADAPT and AHCA didn't come off as scheduled, ADAPT members attempted to storm Opryland Hotel. Ninety-seven of them were arrested for trespassing. The real pity is that ADAPT can and should be making a serious contribution to this nation's health care debate. Per-aps its members sincerely believed that the only way they could draw attention to their cause was through protest. But even then, they were protesting to the wrong people. AHCA and ADAPT are both advocacy groups. ADAPT shouldn't be taking its case to AIWA. It should be making its pitch to Congress, the Clinton administration and state legislatures. But in order for ADAPT to achieve results, government officials need to view . ADAPT as a serious, responsible advocacy group. ADAPT's cause is too just, too necessary, and too immediate to be lost in a confusing shouting match. People can hear ADAPT's message much more clearly when its members talk, not shout.
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[This page continues the article from image 846. Please refer back to image 846 for the full text].
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ADAPT organizers aimed this week's protests not a the Opryland Hotel, but at the hotel's guests--the American Health Care Association, which was holding its annual convention here. As the nation's nursing home industry lobby, the association is ADAPT's archenemy. ADAPT is demanding that the United States provide more health care for disabled people in their own homes by redirecting more than $5 billion in Medicaid funds from nursing homes. The activist group says 1.7 million institutionalized citizens could live independently at home if these services were offered. What's more, the group says it would cost less-- $8000 a year for each patient receiving in-home care compared to $30,000 for nursing-home care. The nursing home industry opposes ADAPT and makes millions of dollars in political contributions to ensure its voice is heard in Washington. ADAPT claims profit is the motive for the industry's opposition. ADAPT demonstrators have laid siege to the previous two association conventions. In 1992 at San Francisco, more than 100 ADAPT members were arrested, and 75 went to jail in 1991 at the convention at Orlando, Fla. ADAPT members have been in Nashville since Sunday to protest and try to meet with the American Health Care Association, which is having its annual convention at the Opryland Hotel. The group is demanding that 25 percent of all Medicaid dollars be diverted from nursing homes to home health care. ADAPT protesters demonstrated Sunday at the entrance to the Opryland Hotel before being told they'd be able to meet with AHCA officials Tuesday.
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The Tuesday meeting, however, never materialized and angry ADAPT members stormed the hotel in protest. The 97 members who were arrested were charged with criminal trespassing. They are to appear in court at the Metropolitan Davidson County Detention Facility on Harding Place today. Opryland Hotel officials, trying to avoid further violent protests, contacted ADAPT leaders Wednesday morning "to see if there wasn't any way to do something that was more positive than what happened Tuesday night," ADAPT co-founder Bob Audberger said. Tom Adkinson, an Opryland spokesman, said the meeting was called "to accommodate" the ADAPT protesters. "We really have tried to be accommodating all week," he said. "We want to create a good event rather than anything else. I think the staging of this event is a positive sign." Protest organizers say they were not displeased that the association chose Nashville for this year's gathering. Tennessee is home to four of the nation's largest nursing home chains, and the state provides in-home health care service for only about 400 people. [Subheading] A question of freedom ADAPT says many disabled people leave Tennessee for states with more in-home services. Their only other choice: Join the 33,000 patients in Tennessee nursing homes. LaTonya Reeves, who is blind and has cerebral palsy, says she left her family and home in Memphis for Denver so she can live independently. An attendant visits her apartment every day. "I miss my family, but I don't miss worrying about losing my freedom," Reeves says. I'd rather die than go to a nursing home. At Wednesday's rally at the hotel where the 350 ADAPT members stayed during their Nashville visit, protesters passed around a microphone to tell of their triumphs. They described how they faked injuries to distract police while their friends barged into the hotel. Some said their abandoned their wheelchairs and proudly crawled toward the association's meeting room. It was the 22nd arrest for Coleman, a diminutive woman of 39 who suffers from a degenerative muscle disease. She makes no apologies for her organization's brashness. "We fought for years to change things through normal channels without success," she says. "Older people and disabled people should not be stuck away in warehouses to die. This is a civil rights issue, and it's time to take it to the streets."
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PHOTO [from Incitement] by Tom Olin: A woman [Marva Ways] with her hair in braids in a top-knot bun, sits in her wheelchair, legs crossed in front of her. She looks tired but assured as she gazes out in front of her. In her two hands she cradles a microphone. She is wearing black fingerless gloves and her fingers are extended so the microphone is between her palms. [caption below reads:] Marva Ways charged up the crowds at the Nashville action.
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[Headline] Disabled activists think tactics work By Jeff Woods and Rob Moritz Banner Staff Writers At the height of this week's clash between police and disabled-rights activists at Opryland Hotel, one enraged protester shouted, "It's Apocalypse Now!" As a police helicopter swept across the sky, the throng of demonstrators charged into out-numbered security guards at the hotel's entrance. Before the battle ended, over-turned wheelchairs littered the roadway, one protester sprawled on the pavement with blood pouring from his head, and police arrested 97 others on charges of criminal trespass. The bleeding demonstrator was not seriously injured. But if the scene bore any resemblance to Francis Ford Coppola's Vietnam War movie, protesters were gleeful. They are front-line fighters for America's newest civil rights movement--the crusade for equal rights for people with physical disabilities. "I just want to say, you all kicked ass. It was one hell of an action," protest organizer Bob Kakfa told a victory rally Wednesday before the demonstrators began leaving Nashville. "You guys. knock down barricades better than any battering ram," Kafka yelled from his wheelchair as the crow cheered, then chanted "Free Our People!" The protesters belong to ADAPT (American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today), a 10-year-old, Denver-based organization practicing the politics of confrontation around the country. ADAPT members stage rallies, occupy offices, blockade buildings and force mass arrests [Please see B-3] (unavailable at this time) [Headline] ADAPT: Group doesn't care if others see tactics as violent, offensive [Continued from page B-1] (unavailable at this time) in order to gain the media spotlight for their cause. [Subheading] CMA protest averted Three noted country artists met with the disabled activists Wednesday and said they "sympathize" with their goals. The meeting with the artists was part of a compromise that prevented any possible ADAPT-sponsored disruption of the nationally televised Country Music Association Awards. The group had threatened such an action after 97 protesters were arrested Tuesday for trespassing at the Opryland Hotel.. "we are here to try to help and help you every way we can. We want to bring attention to your cause and your fight," Grand Ole Opry member Porter Wagoner told about 150 members of ADAPT. "These people need to be heard. We hope we can bring people's attention to it," Wagoner said. Wagoner, Bill Anderson and William Lee Golden met with the protesters in a parking lot on Music Valley Drive across from the Opryland Hotel. The three country artists each were presented with an ADAPT T-shirt and a list of the group's goals and objectives. "These people do have a reason for what they're doing," Wagoner said. "They should be heard." Golden, a former member of the Oak Ridge Boys, specifically was requested by ADAPT when the offer was made by Opryland to call Wednesday's meeting.
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"We sympathize with your plight here," Golden told ADAPT members. Anderson said he hopes to learn more about the organization and its goals. "The first step of the education is learning," Anderson said, adding that he sympathized with the group. "By the grace of God she isn't out there," Anderson said after the meeting with ADAPT. Becky Anderson suffered severe head injuries in the wreck. She has since recovered but suffers from some lasting brain damage. Auberger said ADAPT made a name for itself during the trip to Nashville. "I'd say it has been very successful," he said. "When the public starts understanding issues, change comes." Auberger also said Nashvillians are more understanding of the disabled and who they are. "I think people of Nashville have a better perception of people with disabilities. They'll no longer think of us as helpless or pitiful." The meeting with the country artists was a "postive way" to end ADAPT's trip to Nashville, Auberger said. "We got some assurances from them that they're really interested in learning more," he said. "Our next stop will be Las Vegas, when AHCA has its next national convention." [Subheading] No room for pity Members of ADAPT do not mind if their protest tactics offend. Their newsletter is named Incitement, and many wear T-shirts bearing a defiantly anti-pity slogan. "Our strategy flies in the face of the stereotype that disabled people are helpless, dependent and pitiful. In fact, we are strong, determined and powerful," says Diane Coleman, leader of Tennessee's ADAPT chapter.
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Nashville Banner Tuesday, September 28, 1993 Local & State B [Headline] POLICE BEAT By Glenn Henderson [Subheading] On a roll : They came, they sat --and they appear to be conquering. None have been arrested--yet--even though members of Americans with Disabilities for Attendant Programs Today (ADAPT) stopped traffic at a major intersection and trashed the state Capitol building, leaving garbage and ADAPT stickers in the governor's hallways. The organization protested Sunday at the American Health Care Association's annual convention, blocking McGavock Pike near the Opryland Hotel for hours. The group wants federal money currently going to AHCA--a nursing home lobbying association— to be rerouted to care at home. They regularly protest at AHCA conventions. "We were very lenient with them Sunday night," Metro police spokesman Don Aaron says. Aaron was so concerned with the potential media coverage of police arresting the disabled protesters that he called a meeting prior to the AHCA convention — a meeting with newspaper editors and TV news directors. Kind of a pre-protest damage control meeting. And the next day, police held a training class at the South Sector precinct to teach officers safe ways to subdue and arrest disabled protesters. "The week isn't over," Aaron says. "The word has been conveyed to them that in the future, if they are told to leave or clear a roadway and they refuse, we're going to arrest them." There is irony here: Metro prepared to deal with them at Opryland, but state police have jurisdiction over the Capitol.
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PHOTO by Tom Olin: A man [Quentin Williams] is lying on his side on the ground, partially in his manual wheelchair which is also on it's side. His feet are strapped to the footrests and he is raising his head slightly from the pavement of the road. His right arm is extended and his left hand is raised above his hip. He has an expression of concern and pain. In the back of the photo at some distance other wheelchairs and a couple of people's legs are visible. They are all moving away from him.
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The Tennessean, Monday September 27, 1993 [This article is in Images ADAPT 822 and ADAPT 821 but the entire text is included here for easier reading.] Photo by Casey Daley, staff: the picture frame is filled with marchers in ADAPT T-shirts coming toward the camera. One poster reads "Free Our People" and another "Stop Building Nursing Homes" Most of the marchers in the photo are in wheelchairs and looking determined. Doug Chastain head is in the very front, and Loretta Duefriend is behind hime. Behind her (with the posters) are Robin Stephens barefoot with no shoes, and to her left Laura Hershey is driving her chair with her mouth and has on a chest strap. Arthur Campbell is behind Laura in a white shirt with a picture of Wade and Lincoln on it. Severak riws behind them and behind a man walking are two women walking, Molly Blank with a smile and her hand by her chin, and Suzy Polkinghorn in a black T-shirt. Caption reads: Members of a national disability group protest yesterday outside Opryland Hotel where hospital industry leaders are meeting. The protesters want more healthcare dollars to be directed toward home services. [Title] Protesters block hotel for 2 hours by Elizabeth Murray, Staff Writer. John Taratino spent enough time attending a school for the blind where he was “told when to shower, when to eat and when to do my homework" that he knows a nursing home can't be much different. "This is about choice," Taratino, 28, of Long Island, N.Y., said as more than 250 people — all members of a national group called American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today, or ADAPT — demonstrated outside Opryland Hotel yesterday, blocking entrance there for more than two hours. The demonstration literally overtook the intersection of Briley Parkway and Music Valley Drive, delaying an awards-night reception for the Association of Songwriters, Composers and Producers and backing up traffic on Briley Parkway. ADAPT's beef is with the American Health Care Association, the nation's largest lobbying group for nursing homes, which is holding a conference at Opryland this week. To ADAPT, the association represents institutionalization of people with disabilities who would rather live more independently at home. “If people had a choice, nursing homes would diminish or die out completely," said local ADAPT member Diane Coleman, who, like the rest of her group, wants at least 25% of national Medicaid dollars to be funneled into home health care rather than nursing-home care. “The way [nursing homes] make their money is kind of like how ranchers make theirs — so many head of cattle or the number of beds filled," said national ADAPT organizer Mike Auberger of Denver, who helped rally almost 500 people to travel to Nashville to protest the healthcare association. "The industry would like to tell you it’s just a bunch of old people in nursing homes, but a lot of people just have ‘disabilities. The whole idea of redirecting that money makes so much sense. If I'm in a nursing home, someone else is making my choices about what I wear, what I eat, when I sleep, and it costs more." Amid chants of “People are dying, shame on you" and “Free our brothers, free our sisters," association spokeswoman Linda Keegan negotiated with ADAPT organizers a meeting between 50 ADAPT members and the AHCA's leadership, to be held at 3 p.m. tomorrow. Keegan said her group opposes redirecting any Medicaid dollars toward home health services but said, “Perhaps the issue has come to a head because of President Clinton's [health-care reform] proposal. It provides a lot of opportunities for our organizations to work together.” Keegan said the two groups agree on the basic idea of more funding for home health care but disagree on how to go about it. AHCA supports a national policy for long-term health care. "In exchange for the opportunity to make an in-person plea to the association brass, ADAPT members agreed that for the rest of the week they will protest only in a designated area of Opryland Hotel's parking lot. “This situation is truly unfortunate and it's especially unfortunate for innocent third parties to be affected at all," Opryland spokesman Torn Adkinson said. The AHCA convention will continue this week and will feature an address tomorrow morning from retired Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf. BOXED TEXT: [Title] What they want American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today, called ADAPT, wants 25% of the federal Medicaid budget lo be directed toward establishing national policies to pay for personal attendant services so people with disabilities can live at home. The group argues that such home health care is more cost-effective and yields a higher quality of life. "We're saying that, at a minimum, 25% of people who live in nursing homes would like to live in their own home," said Mike Auberger, a national organizer for ADAPT; "But the bottom line is that 90% of the nursing homes in this country are for-profit, and allowing choice would take money from them. The American Health Care Association, the nation's largest nursing-home lobby, "absolutely disagrees“ that tunneling 25% of Medicaid dollars into home health care is a good idea, said Linda Keegan, association spokeswoman. Shifting funds in that way might deny nursing-home care to people who want it, she said. "That is essentially robbing Peter to pay for Paul." The association would rather see additional funds provided so that both nursing-home and at home health care could be offered. The two groups agree on the need for a national policy on long-term health care.
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PHOTO: People are packed in facing a doorway inside the Capitol with their back to the camera. A man [Verlon McKay] has a poster on the back of his chair that reads "Move $$ to Community Services." Back by the door is a camera person filming. Two police officers stand in the doorway talking. Verlon and the person next to him have their fists raised and all the others show with their posture their intense interest in the doorway. Erik von Schmetterling is sitting to Verlon's right and is signing a chant in ASL [Erik is deaf as well as a wheelchair user.]
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PHOTO: A large group of marchers stretch back as far as you can see. Some are in wheelchairs, some are walking. Two posters are visible one says "Give us Freedom" and the other "Attendant Services is a Civil Right. The group fills the frame of the photo.
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PHOTO: A police officer stands in a doorway of the Capitol with his arm across the doorway and a stern look on his face. Under his arm you can see the back of someone in a wheelchair with a sign on their back. In front of him are two other protesters in wheelchairs; one has a poster that reads "Security, Safety, Choice, Quality, My Home" and below that is a bed pan. The other protester is leaning his head back to look at the policeman and he has on a helmet.
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Nashville Banner Tuesday, September 28, 1993 Local & State B [Image] (Banner photos by Larry McCormack): A police officer stands at the center with one arm holding a man in a black cowboy hat [Billy Montalvo], who is standing way off balance. The policeman, with his other hand, is holding a wheelchair push handle of someone totally obscured by another officer with his back toward the camera. Over the other officers shoulder is the face of a woman. In front of the officer on the floor by his feet is a female protester with her arm raised up and in front of her, also on the floor another person is raising a white cane in the air. A man [JT Templeton] in a motorized wheelchair wearing a National Civil Rights Museum sweatshirt is in front to one side, and from that same side someone is reaching toward the cane. They are in a doorway. [Image Caption] Tennessee State Trooper Harold Gooding moves disabled-rights activist Billy Montalvo away from a door leading to Gov. Ned McWherter's office during Monday's protest on Capitol Hill. No arrests were made. Banner photos by Larry McCormack [Headline] Activists call meetings '1st step'