ADAPT Action Reports

clear space Bob Liston and Bob Kafka ADAPT activists playing cards ADAPT crowd in the hotel lobby ADAPT Activist ADAPT Activist Bunny McLeod ADAPT Activist ADAPT Activists meet in the lobby Dale Reid ADAPT Activist ADAPT Activist Bob Liston Daniese Michael Heinrich ADAPT Activist ADAPT Activist The Hotel Entrance Bob Kafka Computer Monitor shows a New Look to ADAPTs website Fun Run Registration

ADAPT Arrives in Washington DC.

ADAPT Action Report: Saturday, April 25, 2009

By Tim Wheat

ADAPT Activits playing cardsADAPT, the nation's leading direct action disability rights organization, gathers in Washington DC to end the institutional bias by passing the Community Choice Act S683 and HR1670.

ADAPT was successful using direct action to make busses accessible. In the 1980s the group targeted the American Public Transit Authority and the federal government to ensure a national policy of accessible public transit. The focus of ADAPT has always been equality, following transit accessibility, ADAPT has, worked for responsible healthcare policy.

In 2005, Money Follows the Person legislation was adopted as another step in ADAPT's campaign to end the bias in US Medicaid policy. Institutions and Nursing homes have a preference built into the program; they have assured funding while alternatives to expensive facilities are optional Medicaid programs. Home And Community - Based Services (HCBS) allow people with disabilities to remain in their own homes. HCBS programs often suffer because states cannot make cuts to institutional care, but they can cut the optional Medicaid services.

The logical next step to the "Money Follows the Person" legislation is the Community Choice Act. "Money Follows the Person" allows states to redirect long-term care funding from institutions to alternatives in the community. This will allow many Americans to choose to live at home rather than an expensive institution. The Community Choice Act is necessary to continue the trend away from institutions and get people with disabilities the services and supports to live at home. Choice is what every American expects, but far too often people with disabilities do not have the option of living at home, and can only get the long-term Medicaid services they need in a costly and intolerable facility.

Follow what ADAPT is doing in Washington DC at the ADAPT Action Report.

Rainy DC streetsThe ADAPT Action Report is organized to let you follow the ADAPT Action in Washington DC. This year the direct-action group will use video phones to upload video on YouTube.com. The idea is to show the hard-work and exciting in-your-face advocacy of ADAPT. There is nothing like the experience of an ADAPT Action, but if you cannot be in Washington, the ADAPT Action Report will try to capture some of the feel of being there.

Follow this link for the YouTube action: http://www.youtube.com/ADAPTvideo.

Follow the Action on Twitter: http://twitter.com/NationalADAPT.

Look for Twitter photos: http://twitpic.com/photos/NationalADAPT.

The Action Reports are news of the day with photos of the ADAPT activists in action. The ADAPT Action Blog is so you may have first-hand accounts from people involved in the ADAPT Action. News releases are collected in the news section and there is a direct link to the photos by Tom Olin of the Action and a link to activists uploading video from the action on YouTube.