Community Choice Act and the Presidential Nominees

 Members of the Atlantis Community CIL and Denver ADAPT met with the
Republican presumptive presidential candidate John McCain at a Town Hall Meeting today. Six members of ADAPT, including teenagers from the Summer Youth Program, sat in the front of the auditorium to listen to McCain's policies for his administration. When he took comments from the audience he handed the microphone
to Dawn Russell. She explained the legislation called the Community Choice Act and asked him why he was not signed on. Mr. McCain stated he would not support the legislation. He then offered several poor reasons for his decision and ended by saying we would have to let thevoters decide that one. Having recaptured the microphone, he did state he supported the ADA, but had no interest in hearing that the ADA was entirely different from the CCA.

CCA supports putting control in the hands of the individual instead of Government, it supports states' ability to use limited Medicaid funds for community services which people prefer and which are
more cost effective.

Presumptive Presidential Candidate Barak Obama has signed on as a co-sponsor to the bill already.

ADAPT's Statement on CCA:

For decades, people with disabilities, both old and young, have wanted alternatives to nursing homes and other institutions when they need long term services. Our long term care system has a heavy institutional bias

Norman DeLisle, MDRC
"With Liberty and Access for All!"
GrandCentral: 517-589-4081
MDRC Website: http://www.copower.org/
LTC Blog: http://ltcreform.blogspot.com/
Recovery: http://therecoveringlife.blogspot.com/
Change: http://prosynergypsc.blogspot.com/

ADAPT Action Folow-up

Apparently, the Democratic Party released this statement today about how
the RNC and Sen. McCain's office treated ADAPT on Tuesday. Just fyi,

For Immediate Release May 1, 2008

Contact: Damien LaVera 202-863-8148

Dean: Arrests Show McCain Out of Touch
With Americans With Disabilities

Washington, DC - This week, even as McCain was traveling the country
outlining a flawed health care agenda that does little to increase access
to quality, affordable health care for Americas working families, John
McCain showed how out of touch he is with Americans with disabilities.
Instead of meeting with disability rights activists to explain why he
refuses to co-sponsor the Community Choice Act of 2007, Senator McCain's
staff allowed more than 20 activists to be arrested in front of his Senate
office. [Associated Press, 4/29/08]

Both Democratic presidential candidates are co-sponsors of the bill, which
would allow countless Americans with disabilities the choice to live and
work in their own homes and communities. In addition, Democratic National
Committee Chairman Howard Dean has met with community activists and
repeatedly expressed his support for the bill. By contrast, McCain has
refused to join the effort to end the persistent institutional bias in
America's health care system that forces too many people with disabilities
into nursing homes and institutions. The bipartisan bill would amend the
Social Security Act to allow people who are eligible for Medicaid coverage
of nursing home costs to spend it instead on home-based or community care.

DNC Chairman Howard Dean issued the following statement:
"At a time when John McCain is on the campaign trail talking about health
care choices, he refuses to explain why he opposes a bill that would let
Americans with disabilities choose how and where to live, work and receive
care. I am proud to lead a Party that supports the fundamental right of
every single American to make his or her own choices about where to live
and work. Apparently John McCain and his staff would rather let activists
get arrested outside his office than explain his position on this critical
issue. John McCain is either profoundly out of touch with the needs and
challenges confronting Americans with disabilities or just doesn't care.
Either way, he's the wrong choice for Americas future."

Paid for and authorized by the Democratic National Committee,
http://www.democrats.org. This communication is not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
FOR MORE INFORMATION on ADAPT visit our website at http://www.adapt.org/

ADAPT in Washington

For Immediate Release May 1, 2008

For information contact:
Bob Kafka 512-431-4085
Marsha Katz 406-544-9504
http://www.adapt.org


Disability Rights Advocates Challenge McCain and Republicans on Lack of
Support for Community Choice Act: McCain's Office Responds by Arresting
Over 40


Washington, D.C.--- ADAPT took over the offices of Sen. John McCain and
the Republican National Committee Tuesday, demanding support for the
Community Choice Act (S799, HR1621) from the only presidential candidate
who has thus far not signed on as a co-sponsor. What they got for their
efforts were arrests, excuses, and statements about how the National
Republican Committee doesn't have the power to call its own presidential
candidate to ask for a meeting.


"I don't get it," said Cassie James, an Organizer with ADAPT of
Pennsylvania, "Sen. McCain's website says 'There is no cause greater
than protection of human dignity.' We were at his office asking him to
partner with us to protect OUR human dignity by supporting legislation
that allows all older and disabled Americans to live in their own homes
instead of being forced into nursing homes where all dignity and personal
privacy are lost. This is not rocket science; it's basic human and civil
rights!"


About 250 ADAPT activists filled Sen. McCain's office in the Russell
Senate Building and the halls just outside the office. A few blocks away
another 250 ADAPT activists stormed the offices of the Republican National
Committee (RNC), with 5 wheelchairs gaining entry, and the remainder
blocking all the doors and driveways. There was a nine hour standoff into
the night, during which the RNC staff refused access to the bathroom for
the ADAPT members who were in the building. The main ADAPT demand was that
the RNC assist to schedule a meeting with Sen. McCain where ADAPT
representatives could talk about support for the Community Choice Act. The
RNC staff repeatedly stated that they did not have the power to call their
candidate's campaign staff to ask for such a meeting.

"I find it very hard to believe that the organization that raises so much
of the funding for the presidential campaign can't talk to its own
candidate," said Randy Alexander, Tennessee ADAPT Organizer, who was
trapped inside the RNC building for nine hours and not allowed to use a
bathroom. "We weren't asking them to guarantee a meeting, just to pick up
the phone, call Sen. McCain, and try to get a meeting set up. Any person
on the street could make that call, yet they said they didn't have the
power to do that."

During the nine hours ADAPT spent trying to gain cooperation from the RNC,
many Congressional co-sponsors and supporters of the bi-partisan Community
Choice Act came by to personally meet some of the people affected by this
important legislation and to congratulate their efforts to get it passed.
The 500 ADAPT activists in Washington this week from nearly every state in
the union represent thousands more ADAPT members back home who don't have
the ability travel to the nation's capitol, a very expensive destination,
to make their voices heard. And those thousands of ADAPT members
nationally are only the tip of the disability voting bloc nationally, a
voting bloc that is currently feeling disrespected and ignored by Sen.
McCain and the Republican Party.

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FOR MORE INFORMATION on ADAPT visit our website at http://www.adapt.org/