May 10, 2001
For more information, contact:
Bob Kafka (512) 431-4085 (cell)
Marsha Katz (406) 239-7490 (cell)
(202) 479-4000 (D.C. hotel)

Disability Rights Activists Demand Bush Make Good on Promises

(WASHINGTON DC)  Over 500 members of ADAPT, the nation's premiere grassroots disability rights organization, are in Washington for the next week to gain meetings with the new Bush Administration, and demand that the President make good on promises issued early in his tenure.

In early February, as one of his first official acts, President Bush issued his New Freedom Initiative, committing his administration to assuring the rights and inclusion of persons with disabilities in all aspects of American life. The Summary of Action in Part A, Title VI of the Initiative states:

"President Bush has committed to sign an order supporting swift implementation of the Olmstead decision. The order will support the most integrated community-based settings for individuals with disabilities, in accordance with the Olmstead decision."

Coming together from as many as 40 of the states, ADAPT wants Bush to follow through with issuing the Executive Order supporting Olmstead. 

"I don't know what swift means in Washington, D.C.," said Mike Oxford, State Organizer for ADAPT Kansas and Executive Director of Topeka's Independent Living and Resource Center, " but out here in the real world in Kansas, we don't understand why it's been more than 90 days and the President still hasn't kept his word to issue the order. It sure doesn't feel swift to all the folks who continue to be trapped in nursing homes and other institutions."

In addition to the promised Executive Order, ADAPT wants Bush to back up the order with funding in the Medicaid and Medicare budgets to assist states to fulfill their legal obligation to implement the U.S. Supreme Court's Olmstead decision. The Olmstead decision prohibits discrimination against persons with disabilities of all ages by segregating them in institutional settings when services and supports could instead be delivered in their own homes in the community.

"What it comes down to," said Bob Kafka, ADAPT Texas State Organizer, "is we want the President to be a man of his word. We want him to support a policy of Community First! by endorsing legislation that will finally eliminate the outdated institutional bias that continues to plague our Medicaid/Medicare funded long term care service and support system. And we want to meet with President Bush to talk about how to work together to achieve that reform, and guarantee that no American is ever again forced into a nursing home or other institution."

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