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June 18, 1997 9:25 Eastern Time
SECTION: NATIONAL DESK, HEALTH CARE WRITER
LENGTH: 603 words
HEADLINE: Disabilities Group Protests at DOL; Gains Meeting with Clinton
CONTACT: Mike Auberger, 202-289-5959, Jennifer Burnett, 202-842-4466, or Joe Ehman,
202-842-4466, all of the American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today
DATELINE: WASHINGTON, June 18
BODY:
Members of a national disability rights organization, ADAPT, held a protest at the
Department of Labor, forcing the White House to keep its promise made November 1996.
Three hundred members of ADAPT occupied the building while ADAPT representatives
negotiated with White House staff, forcing a meeting with the president scheduled for Sept. 10.
The protest was a result of a Clinton Administration promise. In November 1996 a letter
was sent to ADAPT by Assistant to the President Alexis Herman, promising a meeting between
ADAPT and the president in the first quarter of 1997. The meeting never took place.
Alexis Herman is now Secretary of Labor, and ADAPT went to her office to demand
accountability for the promise.
The protest caused an immediate reaction from the president's office. The current
Assistant to the President Maria Eschaveste and ADAPT member Bob Kafka negotiated an
agreement over the telephone. She then faxed a confirmation to ADAPT at the Department of
Labor, verifying that the White House Office of Public Liaison had not only arranged the meeting
with the president but would also coordinate a policy meeting on Wednesday, June 25. This
policy meeting will include Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala, the heads of
Domestic Policy Council, National Economic Council, the Office of Public Liaison and ADAPT.
In a letter to ADAPT dated June 16, Echaveste wrote, "We are ready to begin substantive
policy discussions immediately and are waiting for ADAPT to propose dates for the first meeting."
ADAPT is in Washington to support the passage of CASA, Community Attendant Services Act (CASA), which is expected to be introduced next week by Speaker of the House Newt
Gingrich. This legislation will redirect Medicaid's long term care funding from nursing homes to
home and community- based services. It will allow people to live in their own homes by providing
services in the community instead of in nursing homes and other institutions.
ADAPT spent the afternoon surrounding the Bus Terminal stopping buses in downtown
D.C., sending a message to Greyhound that access is a civil right. Last year Greyhound
maneuvered a delay in the development of ADA regulations regarding over the road coaches.
With this delay in place, Greyhound is planning to purchase new inaccessible buses.
June 18, 1997 9:25 Eastern Time
SECTION: NATIONAL DESK
LENGTH: 562 words
HEADLINE: Disability Rights Activists Demonstrating in Washington
CONTACT: Mike Auberter, 202-289-5959, Jennifer Burnett or Joe Ehman, 202-842-4466,
all for the American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today
DATELINE: WASHINGTON, June 16
BODY:
The following was released today by the American Disabled for Attendant Programs
Today (ADAPT):
Disability rights activists are in Washington, D.C., for two weeks to demonstrate to
President Clinton, Congress and all Americans just how important the passage of CASA
(Community Attendant Services Act) is for this country. In an earnest attempt to hold President
Clinton to unfulfilled promises he's made for five years, 250 ADAPT members from across the
country marched to the White House yesterday. Concerned by the administration's clear lack of
commitment to honoring an agreement to meet with ADAPT, they hand-delivered a 6-foot-by-3-
foot signed letter to the president. A copy of that letter had been faxed to Clinton earlier in the
day.
"With over 2 million Americans with disabilities locked away in nursing homes and other
institutions, ADAPT must take a stand...." opens the letter, which goes on to chronicle the history
of broken promises the Clinton administration has made to ADAPT since 1992. The letter
mentions a phone call made to the home of ADAPT member Mike Oxford of Kansas at 4 p.m.
on June 13, 1997, by White House spokesperson Bill White. White told Oxford that ADAPT
should now begin to meet with HCFA (Health Care Financing Committee) and the Domestic
Policy Council before meeting with the president in September.
The letter to Clinton goes on to explain why this is not acceptable. If this was a serious
offer of preparations for a meeting with the president, why wasn't this brought up in November
1996, asked ADAPT organizer Bob Kafka. "Given the history of the White House and its
dealings with ADAPT, we cannot accept this phone call as a formal, serious invitation.
Considering the previous promises detailed above, ADAPT must have a written commitment
signed by you stating your commitment to the principles of CASA as well as your commitment to
the process and date for our meeting."
ADAPT ends the letter by telling Clinton that unless they receive a written commitment by
5 p.m. today (June 16), they will have to consider the phone call made by Bill White, "another
delay tactic by the White House. We are waiting for your written commitment."
June 18, 1997 9:25 Eastern Time
SECTION: NATIONAL DESK, HEALTH CARE WRITER
LENGTH: 656 words
HEADLINE: ADAPT in Washington to Give Real Story on Nursing Home Industry
CONTACT: Mike Auberger, 202-289-5959, Jennifer Burnett or Joe Ehman, 202-842-4466
all of the American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today
DATELINE: WASHINGTON, June 14
BODY:
The following was released by the American Disabled for Attendant Programs
Today (ADAPT):
ADAPT, American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today, is in Washington, D.C., for
two weeks to give the American public the real story on billions of federal dollars wasted on the
nursing home industry.
They'll hold Newt Gingrich to his promise made to ADAPT in his hometown office in
Georgia, on Nov. 3, 1996. At that time, he signed a hand-written agreement with ADAPT: "to
help pass a law making attendant services available to people now stuck in nursing homes."
Twenty-four hours later, a phone call came to ADAPT from Air Force One, pledging President
Clinton's commitment to meet with ADAPT in the first quarter of 1997 to discuss support for
CASA.
ADAPT is a nationwide grassroots disability-rights group, and its members travel from
throughout the country twice a year to demonstrate and support a major change in the national
long-term care system. In the current system, nursing homes and other institutions are required by
states, so the industry has a free ride, an entitlement. However, there is no requirement for states
to provide in-home community-based attendant services. CASA will redirect money that now
goes to these institutions to fund a national community-based attendant services program by
allowing the dollars to follow the individual back into the community. ADAPT's message to
elected officials and the American public while in Washington, D.C., is "our homes not nursing
homes." According to Mike Oxford, ADAPT organizer from Kansas, "Funding for in-home and
community-based services must be a top priority for the 105th Congress."
Most Americans believe that nursing homes are a necessary evil, that older, frail people and
younger people with severe disabilities need to be in nursing facilities, and that this industry is
providing a decent, humane service by caring for those who can no longer live at home. But what
most Americans don't know is that the majority of people living in nursing homes could live at
home if appropriate community-based services were available. Speaker Gingrich now knows this.
He has committed his office to assist ADAPT in providing the option for people to live in the
community by sponsoring and introducing CASA by June 21. During a conference call with
ADAPT on June 7, Speaker Gingrich affirmed his position:
Copyright 1997 U.S. Newswire, Inc.
U.S. Newswire
Copyright 1997 U.S. Newswire, Inc.
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Copyright 1997 U.S. Newswire, Inc.
U.S. Newswire
"I think that in the future, when people are diagnosed to be in a situation
where they get resources, the resources should follow the person and not go to the
institution."
The Memphis Center for Independent Living
1633 Madison Avenue,
Memphis, TN 38104
(901) 726-6404 v/tty (901) 726-6521 fax
mcil@mcil.org
MCIL is a United Way of the Mid-South member Agency
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