ADAPT Utah
Adapt Utah is both a chapter of the national ADAPT and is a project of the Disabled Rights Action Committee.
The Problem
|
Millions of America’s elderly and citizens with disabilities are unnecessarily segregated—incarcerated in nursing homes and similar institutions. Our nation’s shameful policy states that these individuals can only get the timely assistance they need by moving into nursing homes. This policy guarantees funding for these nursing homes, giving this industry a monopoly. Services exist which would allow our elderly and citizens with disabilities to remain in their own homes, among family, neighbors and friends, but the wait for these funds can be years, even decades. The Solution MiCASSA (S971 and HR2032) is federal legislation that would allow nursing home funding to be used for community attendant care services so individuals could live in their own homes, directing their own care and not have to enter nursing homes.
|
Money Follows the Person (H1811 and S 1394) would allow people who are in nursing homes to leave and take their nursing home funding with them. They could use these funds to hire and direct their own personal attendants.
What We Are Doing
Once each year we join with approximately 400 of our disabled brothers and sisters from around the country to protest the monopoly our government has given nursing homes for long term care. At this time we also meet with our congressional delegation to impress on them the importance of passing MiCASSA and Money Follows the Person. In addition, once each year we again join with national ADAPT to protest the segregation and incarceration of millions of persons with disabilities in our “institutional gulag.” We have marched from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C.
We write letters. We make phone calls. We block streets and buildings. We get arrested. Our rallying cries are “Free Our People” and “Rather go to jail than to die in the nursing home.”
This is vitally important to us.
What You Can Do
 |
· Contact your Representative and Senator. They need to hear from a broach cross section of our state and know that this is an issue that impacts everyone who has an aging relative, who knows and cares about a person with a disability or who may age or become disabled themselves. Urge them to pass MiCASSA and Money Follows the Person. |
|
|
· Donate to our cause. Most of our members have very limited funds and rely on donated funds to get to Washington, D.C. and other needed spots on the country so their voices can be heard. The nursing home industry donates millions to campaigns to insure their voices will be heard. Help us balance this. ADAPT Utah is a project of the Disabled Rights Action Committee, a 501 (c) 3 Non Profit, and your donation will be tax deductible. |
|
|
Join us! (Click here to go to our on-line membership application) The only requirement for membership is that you agree with our cause and contribute all the heart, passion, energy and funds that you can. |
