ADAPT (American Disabled For Attendant Programs Today), the prominent disability rights activist group in the United States, has been strongly protesting the construction of the Lincoln Developmental Center (read: institution) in Chicago since late last week.
The main issue under contention here is unnecessary institutionalization, that people with disabilities are forced to choose, when their Medicaid dollars are tied to institutional services as opposed to paying for independent living options in the community chosen by people themselves. Despite the passage of the "Money Follows the Person" legislation, Illinois consistently ranks extremely poorly when it comes to community and independent living for people with disabilities. And now Gov. Blagojevich wanted to reopen an institution for people with developmental disabilities in Chicago.
Needless to say big money exists in running institutions and the team of institution supporters revealingly includes the American Medical Association (AMA), some of whose members have financial interests in pushing their patients towards institutions, and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), whose members get employed by these big institutions.
ADAPT's agenda included getting these organizations to endorse the Community Choice Act which is aimed at removing the bias towards state sponsored nursing homes and institutionalization in state Medicaid programs and offers people real choice as to where they want to live.
Not only were ADAPT activities met with opposition by both, there were massive arrests of protesters on both occasions (55 for barricading the AMA on Monday) and after negotiations with AFSCME failed on Wednesday.
ADAPT advocates through civil disobedience and protests and they make their point. Sometimes that is the only way to make your point, to air your issues in public, and to open the eyes of the average non-disabled person. I was reading some of the comments posted on a blog entry about the AMA demonstration on the Chicago Reader. It is very informative to see how people react to such events.
Read ADAPT's daily coverage of their week in Chicago.
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