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Accueil / Albums / Baltimore - Washington DC, Spring 1995 34
ADAPT (934)
[Headline] CAPITOL CONFRONTATIONS [Image] [Image caption] ADAPT left Gingrich a wake-up call an his apartment pager system. Photo: Tom Olin Out on the plaza in front of the Washington, DC headquarters of the Department of Health and Human Services, HHS, Mike Auberger's cellular phone rang. HHS Secretary Donna Shalala's aide was calling to complain that inside the Administration's fourth floor offices ADAPT's cries were distracting the staff. Outside, stretching across the plaza and lined six deep, ADAPT and our supporters were holding a press conference, ADAPT style, to announce our arrival in the Capitol and to call again for freedom for our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, and for our grandparents from the nursing homes of America which still imprison almost two million of us. "Can you hear us, on the inside?" we chanted to the bureaucrats who oversee the national policies which support the institutional bias in our long term care system. Day leader Maria Ways spoke to the crowd saying "ADAPT wants to fundamentally change our long term care system so that people with disabilities will no longer be forced into nursing homes and other institutions. We have challenged the Clinton Administration to endorse a national attendant services program. They have responded! .... We will take our message to Congress! We want Congress to pass [a national attendant services program] CASA! Only then will the nursing home industry lose its deathgrip on people in this country who need long term care services." Secretary Shalala had agreed to meet with us and have her Health Care Finance Administration, HCFA, officials sit down with ADAPT and try to work on ways to end this bias. ADAPT had agreed to focus on other collaborators Congress and its leadership. So 700 ADAPT supporters who had gathered from around the nation for the press conference turned and marched up the hill, destination: the Speaker's office inside the Capitol. [Subheading] CRIPS IN THE CRYPT Just one year ago, while still Minority Whip, Newt Gingrich had met with ADAPT and promised to support a national attendant services program which is consumer controlled. Yet, despite lip service to the program ADAPT is promoting, Gingrich failed to come through. Ongoing, good faith efforts on the part of Georgia ADAPT were shrugged off. Even after ADAPT drafted a bill, the Community Attendant Services Act, CASA, and sent it to him and other legislators to consider sponsoring, Gingrich and his staff would not make a move, would not even say no. Letters and phone requests for a meeting while ADAPT was in town had been ignored. So, once again ADAPT came en force, to Gingrich's door, hoping he would make good on his previous commitments. Marching with 700 is not the same as marching with one hundred. One week post the Oklahoma bombing, federal security was still extremely tight. We entered the Capitol in a steady trickle. As the first of the group entered the restricted area in which the Speaker's office is located, the line strung out through the whole Capitol, through security check, out the accessible east door, down the ramp, and down the driveway to Independence Ave. We had planned to wait until an appointment was made, but Security said anyone who did not leave would be arrested. As arrests started, supporters in the Crypt of the Capitol (the room under the Rotunda) began chanting. "I'd rather go to jail than to die in a nursing home" echoed down the marbled halls. [Subheading] ADAPT MAKES A HOUSE CALL ADAPT was not finished for the day however. We announced we were moving to a shady spot to cool down and have lunch. The shady spot we settled in just happened to be in front of Newt's home, a couple blocks from the Capitol. Hundreds of disabled people out on a picnic creates a scene by itself. [Image] [Image caption] Photo: Tam Olin. The building is owned by the United Methodists. A negotiation team was sent into their office building next door to see if Newt's landlords would have better luck calling him than we had At first there were discussions of proper channels, strategy on our CASA bill, etc. But as it drew closer to closing time and more and more of us began to gather in their lobby, the United Methodists began to call his office in earnest. Then a funny thing happened. We had gathered in the church office, and repeated calls had been ignored by the Gingrich staff. Staff had, at first, claimed Newt was out of town, but it slipped out that he had returned to DC around noon. Then they claimed he was making a speech at the State Department and could not be reached by phone, as all the phones there were out of order. The church people grew outraged as Gingrich's staffs tales grew taller and taller. To add insult to injury, Gingrich's Legislative Director Krister Holladay would put each call on hold and never pick it up again. At one point we were on hold on four lines at once. Media swarmed around. All we asked for was a meeting. First we were told a month's wait, then next week, then Friday. But we were set to leave on Thursday and the Speaker did not offer to cover additional expenses. Finally the head of the United Methodist office said she was joining us and wanted an end to these excuses. But Gingrich was on the lamb. So, as six o'clock came and went, we vowed to seek out the Speaker on Tuesday, and headed for home. The last of our crowd were still trickling in after 11 pm. It had been a long, hard day. At 10:30pm Holladay, the legislative staffer, had called our hotel to offer a meeting next week with five of our people; for the same reasons as before, next week was not acceptable. [Subheading] BACK ON THE BEAT Tuesday we picked up where we left off on Monday. To get into DC from where we were staying we had to shuttle in city buses driven by local transit union members, to the closest Metro stop several miles away. There we set up a relay system and shuttled folks via Metro into downtown. Day two we got off on the stop right outside the Republican National Headquarters. When they saw the first few ADAPT folks arriving, they slammed shut their doors and would not let anyone in without multiple picture ID and a pat down. They had not forgotten our visit last year. Once assembled, we marched over t the Rayburn House Office Building to stop in at Gingrich's district office where we had met with him last year. We had had luck there in the past, perhaps we would have it again this time. That was not to be. We were only met with stonewalling once again. We asked why the Speaker would have pledged support once and then act this way. Why would he ignore a program which would more cost effectively serve people, would get Government off our backs by reducing federally mandated bias for institutions, would support family values by allowing people to remain at home instead of forcing them into institutions in order to receive services, and would support what the people want? His staff had no answer, except to ask the police to arrest us. [Subheading] MESSAGE DELIVERED We returned to Newt's house that afternoon to demand that people be allowed to live in their own homes. We felt the Speaker would best understand the im-portance of one's own home if access to his was made as difficult as he keeps access to ours. [Image] [Image caption] Manor Care was completely surrounded with every entrance blocked. Photo: Tom Olin Charging the front door of the apartment building ADAPT soon packed the circular driveway in front of the building, swarmed up the ramp and covered the lawn and sidewalks. Chants of "Our Homes Not Nursing Homes" and "Free Our People" roared through the air. Tussles at the door got one ADAPT member inside, but Secret Service quickly closed and locked it again. Creative ADAPT members found the intercom system to be let into the building. Instead of simply buzzing inside each apartment, this system connected to the tenants' telephone answering machines. So we filled up Gingrich's tape with messages about community-based attendant services, just in case he was not clear about how we felt about his attempts to trick us. One enterprising ADAPT member, into rock climbing, scaled the building and covered it -- almost to the second floor with our picket signs so Gingrich would get our message in alternate formats. Neighbors looked on, amazed to see how folks receiving services feel about the nursing home industry. Rumor has it that Gingrich had checked into a Quality hotel for the night. [Subheading] CONFRONTING THE OPPOSITION Wednesday was the day for meetings with Shalala and her staff. Wednesday was also the day for the showdown with Manor Care, the third largest nursing home chain in the nation, whose holdings also include Econolodge, Comfort Inns, as well as several other hotel\motel chains. Despite pouring rain ADAPT troops were ready for action. In wave after wave we shuttled to the headquarters of the $2.1-billion-in-yearly-revenues Manor Care Corporation. The Chief Executive Officer Stewart Barnum JR quickly agreed to meet with our negotiating team of Bob Liston, Karen Tamley, Alfredo Juarez, and Cassie James. Tension and confusion over the meeting site almost lead to arrests on the spot, but the police were reigned in and negotiations began. However, different from their big sister corporation Beverly, Manor Care was not even willing to publicly support choice by supporting the creation of a national attendant services program. They used the tired old company line about robbing Peter to pay Paul. ADAPT informed them we want community services for both Peter and Paul, in addition to Mary! That apparently blew their minds. They could not conceive of giving up a penny of the obscene profits they wring from people's lives each year. When negotiations fell through, ADAPT let Manor Care taste what life in a nursing home is all about.‘ Blocking all exits and entrances, ADAPT shut down the headquarters and turned the place into a nursing home. No one went in or out without ADAPT permission. No one appeared to be too fond of this dose of their own medicine. [Image] [Image caption] Folks from 24 states joined ADAPT's protest and no one bitched about the rain which drenched the group several times Photo: Tom Olin. [Subheading] HIGH LEVEL TALKS Meanwhile back in the Capitol, ADAPT representatives and our supporters met with HHS Secretary Donna Shalala. Beltway disability groups were there, and most made it clear they backed ADAPT on this one. Shalala started off trying to convince everyone that we should rally around to support Medicaid and its current programs. But ADAPT countered making it clear that the disability community saw little reason to support the status quo. We argued that to get support for Medicaid, Shalala should offer a bold and better alternative, like ADAPT's Community Attendant Services Act, CASA. People are looking for a change, but right now the only alternative proposed is the Republican's slash and burn plan, which steals the limelight - in large part - for lack of any alternate solution from the Administration. It took the better part of an hour to get her to come around, but by the end Shalala agreed to issue a statement supporting the principles of CASA. Her strong endorsement (see p.9) was issued before 5pm that afternoon. She could not however, endorse redirecting a penny of nursing home funds. Not only did Shalala meet with ADAPT and endorse the basic principle of our proposal, she had Bruce Vladeck, head of the Health Care Finance Administration, HCFA, meet with ADAPT too. Vladeck and his staff sat down with a delegation from ADAPT which included a representative from each of the 24 states participating in this action. Each ADAPT representative outlined a piece of the problem, using a local example to illustrate her or his point. Vladeck and his staff quickly agreed an ongoing dialog was in order, and the rest of the meeting was spent hammering out the plan for this dialog. After these meetings ADAPT's HHS contingent hurried to meet up with the rest of the group. As we neared the protest we got a rare feel for what an ADAPT action feels like from the outside. Police had closed off streets for blocks around the protest site. Traffic was at a crawl and we even had to sneak through the parking lot of a gas station to get near enough to rejoin our group. We later learned that the TV soap operas had been interrupted that afternoon to tell of the protest and the traffic situation. [Subheading] WET 'N' WILD Quickly parking the vans, we came over a hill and were met by the beautiful sight of our fellow ADAPTers in formation around the headquarter& Police milled around them. [Image] [Image caption] Despite torrential rains, ADAPT challenged the third largest nursing home chain, Manor Cue whose profits were 3500 million in 1993. Manor Care also owns several chains of well known hotels and motels. Photo Carolyn Long. It was an eloquent, if wordless, statement about the power of the people, once they refuse to continue cooperating in their own oppression: you want to lock us up for your profits, well you can at least get a feel for the price you extort for your comforts. [Image] [Image caption] Family values, personal responsibility — ADAPT style. Photo: Tom Olin When the police started to arrest they had a big job on their hands. At first, frustrated with their inability to get rid of the problem quickly, police handcuffed people to their chairs and each other. Arrestees were taken to a nearby building for processing. Ironically this building was one Manor Care used to store extra furniture; ADAPT was literally being warehoused by this greedy corporation. Soon however, the sheer numbers began to get to the police, some of whom actually went down the lines of corralled arresters asking if anyone wanted to be "un-arrested." However, we remained firm: We'd rather go to jail than to die in a nursing home! In the end 120 were ticketed. [Subheading] SUPER SUPPORT The Baltimore bus company whose incredible support for our fight for liberty had made our actions possible, arrived and shuttled us home. These fabulous driven, with their chartered buses had shuttled us to various locals all week, including Manor Care headquarters, and had been threatened with arrest by the cops if they returned with more protesters. That night, after watching the ground-breaking video "When Billy Brake His Head and Other Tales of Wonder, ADAPT celebrated the fight for liberty and justice. In various corners of our hotel celebration continued until dawn. Then began the farewells and the long, hard road home. Typical ADAPT, our four day Baltimore action took us down many paths, none of which led to Baltimore.
ADAPT (935)
THE Montgomery Journal The daily newspaper of Montgomery County, Md. Thursday, May 18, 1995 [Image] [Image caption] Demonstrators that blocked Route 29 for more than four hours are arrested by county police officers yesterday. Katherine Frey/Journal [Headline] Nearly 100 arrested in health care protest By TOM BERSON Journal staff writer Police arrested about 100 disabled people, many in wheelchairs, yesterday after an all-day protest that blocked dozens of people in-side a nursing home provider's headquarters in Silver Spring and tied up traffic on Columbia Pike for hours. Police charged the protesters with trespassing and disorderly conduct after some members of the group Americans Disabled for Attendant Programs Today encircled a Manor Care Inc. building and blocked all entrances and exits, while others lined up across Columbia Pike. It was the largest county police action of the year, but the number of protesters wasn't the only difficulty in clearing the scene. It took hours for police to figure out how to arrest so many people in wheelchairs. Police had to drag and carry some of the protesters, who chanted, "We'd rather go to jail than die in a nursing home." "We really don't want to arrest them," police spokesman Sgt. Prank W. Young said yesterday afternoon. Group members said they had come from 28 states to meet with House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., in search of more Medicare funding for in-home attendant care programs. When Gingrich refused to meet with them, they decided to ask Manor Care executives to sign a letter endorsing their proposal, which calls for diverting some Medicare funding for nursing homes. "So much of the budget goes for nursing homes and not much money goes for in-home attendant services," Nate Butler, 43, of Baltimore, said. "The reason we're here is Manor Care is a major player in nursing homes." [Image] [Image caption] Brenda Hanna (right) of Topeka, Kans., and Shirley Klein of Charleston, W.Va., protest Medicare's funding formula. Jeff Taylor, Journal Manor Care is the fourth largest nursing home provider in the United States, according to company spokesman Gregory Miller. The protesters arrived at Route 29 about 11 a.m. to block traffic until they could get a meeting with Manor Care executives, said protester Bob Liston, 43, of Michigan. Ten protesters met with Stewart Bainum Jr., chairman of the board and CEO of Manor Care Inc. for about a half-hour at noon. Bainum said that the meeting went well and that there was agreement on several issues, although he did not endorse the letter. "The nursing home of today is not the same as it was years ago," Bainum said. There is now much more of a focus on rehabilitation," he said. "Over 80 percent of our patients go back home and lead productive lives for decades to come," he said. Bainum said his company was sympathetic to the protesters and offered to lobby with the group for more overall Medicare funding. Liston said he wasn't satisfied. "We didn't get diddly," he said. The group moved from the street to the doors of Manor Care. The protesters did not allow employees to enter or exit the building for hours, although some were able to squeeze out through the doors with the help of police officers. Vicki Dobinski, a fiscal coordinator from Silver Spring, was able to get out, but then realized she had left her car keys inside. "I don't disagree with the people or the cause," she said. "But not being able to get into my office, I'm a bit frustrated." Valerie Williams, a graphic design-er from Silver Spring, also said she had nothing against the protesters. "They have every right to be angry and be upset and stand up for their rights," she said. Some people stuck in the building were there for a health fair, and didn't work for Manor Care. One of them, Kandy Hirsch, a massage therapist, said she fell down struggling to get out and lost a $40 piece of her massage chair in the crowd. "I don't have any gripe with their politics," she said. "I just have an appointment I'm going to be late for." As the day went on, Manor Care officials began to complain that some people needed to get out to pick up their kids from day care, but the protesters wouldn't budge. [Image] [Image caption] Mary Hither (right) of Philadelphia and Elaine Kolb (second from right) of West Haven, Conn., voice disapproval of Medicare's funding formula. Jeff Taylor/Journal "Whenever you're in a 'war' situation, and you take prisoners of war, you don't ask what they do," said George Wolf, 43, of Kansas. Another protester likened the plight of the disabled to blacks be-fore the Civil Rights Act. "We suffer from segregation just the way any black person did," said Lucy Gwin, 52, of New York, citing high numbers of disabled people who are unemployed or "shuttled off to a home in the woods." While protesters chanted slogans outside the doors of Manor Care, others remained on Columbia Pike where they waved signs at passing cars until the road was closed at about 3:30 p.m. The road closing backed up traffic for miles. One neighbor said she sympathized with the protesters' message, but said they were defeating their own cause by angering motorists. "The traffic is unbelievable," said Margaret Kerr of Silver Spring. "This is a monumental disgrace. I told one of the protesters, 'I'm all for your cause, but I think you're alienating an awful lot of people." More than 50 police officers were called in from all five districts. More than a dozen officers who had been taking a civil disobedience training class at the police academy at the time also were called in. Traffic was blocked at University Avenue and the cloverleaf for New Hampshire Avenue as arrests began at 4 p.m. and continued through rush hour. Students at five county schools were kept in class for an extra 30 minutes because buses were held up in the traffic, said Carolyn Reed, county schools bus operations manager. Police spokeswoman Ann Evans described the logistics of cleaning up the scene as "a nightmare." Police borrowed transport vehicles for the disabled from Ride-On and other county agencies to trans-port the protesters to the Silver Spring Armory, where they were to be given citations for trespassing and released. Others were processed at buildings and streets near the scene. Because the effort was time-consuming and diverted manpower from regular beats, police didn't arrest anyone who left peacefully. Young said.
ADAPT (936)
[Headline] ADAPT: FREE OUR PEOPLE [Subheading] STATEMENT AT THE HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES BUILDING MAY 15, 1995 PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES FROM THROUGHOUT THE UNITED STATES ARE AT THE HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES BUILDING BECAUSE ALMOST 2 MILLION PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES ARE LOCKED AWAY AGAINST THEIR WILL IN NURSING HOMES AND OTHER INSTITUTIONS. ADAPT WANTS TO FUNDAMENTALLY CHANGE OUR LONG TERM CARE SYSTEM SO THAT PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES WILL NO LONGER BE FORCED INTO NURSING HOMES AND OTHER INSTITUTIONS. WE WANT TO REDIRECT THE CURRENT FEDERAL FUNDING NOW GOING TO NURSING HOMES AND OTHER. INSTITUTIONS TO CREATE A NATIONAL ATTENDANT SERVICES PROGRAM THAT WILL FREE OUR PEOPLE! WE HAVE CHALLENGED THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION TO ENDORSE A NATIONAL ATTENDANT SERVICES PROGRAM. THEY HAVE RESPONDED! WE WILL BE MEETING WITH SECRETARY OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES DONNA SHALALA AND THE DIRECTOR OF THE HEALTH CARE FINANCING ADMINISTRATION BRUCE VLADECK ON WEDNESDAY, MAY 17TH AT THE HHS BUILDING. ADAPT WILL TELL THEM THAT PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES WILL NO LONGER TOLERATE BEING WAREHOUSED IN INSTITUTIONS LOSING OUR FREEDOM, DIGNITY AND OUR CIVIL RIGHTS. WE WANT THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION TO ACT! SECRETARY SHALALA MUST ACT! THE TIME FOR CHANGE IS NOW! ACTION NOT RHETORIC! WE WANT THEM TO ENDORSE CASA AND THE IT IS BASED ON. ACTION SPEAKS LOUDER THAN WORDS! WE WILL NOW TAKE OUR MESSAGE TO CONGRESS! ADAPT HAS PROPOSED LEGISLATION CALLED THE COMMUNITY ATTENDANT SERVICES ACT (CASA). CASA WILL CREATE THE NATIONAL ATTENDANT SERVICES PROGRAM THAT WILL FINALLY GIVE PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES AND THEIR FAMILIES A REAL CHOICE OF COMMUNITY BASED ATTENDANT SERVICES. WE WANT CONGRESS TO PASS CASA! ONLY THEN WILL THE NURSING HOME INDUSTRY LOSE IT DEATHGRIP ON PEOPLE IN THIS COUNTRY WHO NEED LONG TERM CARE SERVICES. WE WILL TAKE CASA TO THE LEADERSHIP IN CONGRESS! THEY MUST ACT! THEY MUST FREE OUR PEOPLE! P.O. Box 9598 • Denver, CO. 80209 Voice/TDD 303-333-6698
Baltimore/DC May 1995
News footage of protests by ADAPT against Newt Gingrich and Manor Care company, a major owner of nursing homes. Lots of traffic reports too.