ADAPT to Target Blagojevich Newstip Date: 09-05-2007
Governor Blagojevich will be high on the list of targets when hundreds of disability activists gather in Chicago to protest state policies they say promote segregation.
From September 8 to the 13th, members of the disability rights group ADAPT will be in the streets of Chicago, with protests -- likely to include civil disobedience -- focused on shortcomings in state policies as well as demands that the Illinois congressional delegation support disability rights legislation.
On September 9 ADAPT will hold a national housing forum with officials including Kim Kendrick, assistant secretary of HUD for fair housing.
Illinois already ranks in the bottom ten states for providing community-based services that allow disabled and older people to stay in their own homes, according to ADAPT, and recent actions by Blagojevich have made things worse.
When he cut what he called "nonessential spending" from the state budget last month, the governor reduced the state's home services program by $10 million, said Chrissy Mancini of the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability. The program provides personal assistants and other services to enable people with disabilities to continue to live in their homes.
With demand for the program growing steadily -- and wages for personal assistants also rising -- the funding reduction is "a disaster," said Tom Wilson of Access Living.
Meanwhile Blagojevich appropriated up to $15 million to staff a rebuilt state institution for people with developmental disabilities near Springfield. The Lincoln Development Center was closed by Governor George Ryan in 2002 amid ongoing accusations of abuse and neglect.
The two actions show that "he's taking the state in the wrong direction" -- away from implementation of the Olmstead decision, a 1999 Supreme Court ruling that ordered states to provide services for people with disabilities in the least restrictive environment -- said Gary Arnold of Chicago ADAPT.
"ADAPT will send a clear message to the governor" and others, he said, "that supporting the incarceration of people in institutions for the 'crime' of disability will not be tolerated."
A recent survey found 18,000 residents of Illinois nursing homes would rather live in the community, Arnold said. The real number could be much higher, he said.
Every year ADAPT holds two national gatherings, one in Washington, D.C., and one in a city that where disability rights issues need attention, Arnold said. Last year the group rallied in Nashville, Tennessee, where scores were arrested after the mayor ordered police to blockade his office.
In April of this year, a hundred ADAPT members were arrested blocking congressional offices in Washington to demand action on the Community Choice Act, which would allow Medicaid to pay for services and supplies to help people stay in their own homes. The group won commitments for hearings on the bill from leaders of both houses of Congress.
ADAPT's national forum on disability rights in housing, with Kendricks of HUD along with state and local officials, takes place Sunday, September 9, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, 733 W. Madison. Information on protests will be available to the media each morning, Arnold said.