March 23, 2004

For Information contact;

Bob Kafka 512/431-4085

Marsha Katz 406/544-9504

ADAPT Stages Lie-In in Freezing Weather to Secure HHS Meetings, Letters

Washington, D.C. - Braving six hours of unseasonable freezing temperatures in the nations capitol, 500 members of ADAPT staged a "lie-in" around The Health and Human Services (HHS) Building Monday, demanding that HHS leaders restart the process to reverse the institutional bias in the Medicaid long term care program.

Arriving from 7 a.m. on, HHS employees and visitors were greeted by a Long string of empty wheelchairs, and the building doors blocked by several hundred persons with disabilities who were wrapped in sleeping bags and lying on foam mats. Carrying signs reading "We're lying, cuz you're lying," protestors chanted "it's cold, it's freezing, but ADAPT's not leaving" until meeting with top HHS officials.

With HHS Sec. Tommy Thompson out of the country, Dennis Smith, Acting Administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, met outside in the cold with all 500 ADAPT members. Pressed by ADAPT, Smith issued a letter committing incoming CMS Administrator, Mark McClellan to a meeting with ADAPT within 30 days. With phone confirmation from McClellan, Smith also promised that regular meetings between ADAPT and HHS officials would resume.

As the protesters dissembled the lie-in and received assistance to Return to their wheelchairs, 15 ADAPT members met with Smith inside HHS to negotiate on the additional ADAPT demands. Smith and HHS agreed to meet one of those demands by issuing a "Dear State Medicaid Directors letter." The letter will underscore for states that they currently have the ability, with no regulatory or legislative changes, to move people from nursing homes and institutions by transferring the funding to the preferred community services. States like Kansas, Texas and Montana have utilized this approach to move many people out of nursing homes and can offer information and guidance to other states.

Further, the letter will encourage all states to utilize this strategy to provide more home and community based services, as per the U. S. Supreme Court "Olmstead" decision that ruled that forced institutionalization of people who can be served in the community amounts to illegal segregation.

"Were here in Washington to meet with everyone who can help us remove the institutional bias in Medicaid," said Shona Eakin, ADAPT Organizer from Pennsylvania. "That means people in the Medicaid system, like today, and people in Congress who can hold hearings on and pass MiCASSA (S.971 and H.R. 2032) and the Money Follows the Person Act (S. 1394). And we won't give up until all disabled and older Americans have choice in where they live and receive the services and supports they need."

MiCASSA, the Medicaid Community-based Attendant Services and Supports Act, and Money Follows the Person would both provide people the choice to receive services in their own homes and communities rather than be forced into institutional settings to receive those services. On the Senate side, both bills are stuck in the Finance Committee, chaired by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) with Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) as the ranking minority member.

In another gain Monday, ADAPT received a personal statement of support from Democratic Presidential candidate, John Kerry, which said in part, "I applaud the more than 400 ADAPT activists uniting in Washington, D.C. to demand their voices be heard regarding the critically important issue of ending the immoral institutional bias in the Medicaid program. I am firmly opposed to the Bush administrations proposals to turn Medicaid into a block grant to the states. We must strengthen and protect Medicaid. We should help states carry out the Olmstead decision and enact MiCASSA and the Money Follows the Person Act. As with racial segregation, we must put an end to the institutional bias in Medicaid that prevents millions of Americans of all ages from experiencing freedom, independence and choice."

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