(Nashville) ADAPT again demonstrated in front of the Tennessee State Capitol and blocked Charlotte Avenue demanding that Governor Bredesen end the immoral and inhuman policies that split families and segregate people with disabilities. The governor ringed the Tennessee Capitol with state troopers and barricaded the entrances to keep the single sheet of paper with the ADAPT demands from reaching his office. Retreating into his sanctuary from the citizens, the governor again refused to support the Community Choices Act or meet with ADAPT.
“We are just asking to be treated like human beings,” said Don DeVaul of Tennessee. “The governor wants to put us into a warehouse, I might as well get started now.”
Accessible paddy wagons arrived just ten minutes after a group of about 60 returned from an attempt to enter the Capitol Building. The state troopers were obstructing all of the entrances to the public building with vehicles and a line of troopers at the front steps. The ADAPT group, unable to enter the building, headed out to the street and blocked traffic along Charlotte Avenue in front of the capitol.
“I am going to jail because people are dying without the option to get out of nursing homes,” said Ken Walla of ADAPT. “I am going to jail for freedom.”
Activists using wheelchairs were handcuffed in the street and Metro Police carried off those not using wheelchairs. Hundreds of ADAPT activists lined the sidewalk nearby in the cold wind, chanting support for those being arrested.
“The Nashville Chief of Police noted that locking people with disabilities away is costly to the taxpayers,” said Dawn Russell of ADAPT. “Why are nursing homes any different than jails? The sad fact implied by the Chief is that docile incarceration in a nursing home is acceptable. For people with disabilities to be angry at their jailors, however, is shameful and a waste of tax money.”
Following up a demonstration yesterday, ADAPT continued to demand that Tennessee change state policies that force citizens from their homes and families into expensive and undesirable institutions. Around one hundred activists were cited on Monday in the downtown streets of Nashville as ADAPT blocked six intersections and detained thousands of state employees. State money currently is paid to facilities that warehouse people, but the Community Choices Act would allow that money to follow the person into the community and get the services they may need in their own home.
“Bredesen does not like the light being shown on what living in a nursing home is really like,” said Bob Kafka over the public address system outside the Capitol. “Tennessee spends $160 on nursing homes for every dollar the state spends on home and community based services. If Bredesen thinks that nursing homes are one-hundred-and-sixty times better than your own home, we challenge him to leave his home on Chickering Road and stay in the nursing home of his choice for a few days.”
The day began for the ADAPT activists with a march to the Capitol Building through the streets of Nashville. The group of 500 activists stretched several blocks as they made their way in the streets rather than use the sidewalks with Metro Police blocking traffic along the route. At the conclusion of the march, ADAPT held a press conference along Charlotte Ave. in view of Governor Bredesen’s office. The day was windy and cold with only a slight bit of rain.
