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Domov / Albumi / Oznaka ADAPT 80
- ADAPT (705)
Chicago Tribune Photo by Eduardo Contreras: An Asian-American man (Ken Heard) with pulled back hair and large glasses, a white jacket and pale jeans sits in his foot controlled power wheelchair. He blocking part of an escalator, and what he is not blocking, the police officer that is trying to stop him is blocking. The officer's arms are crossed across his chest and Ken has his hands in his pockets. Caption reads: Ken Heard blocks the entrance to an escalator Wednesday in the State of Illinois Center as part of an ADAPT protest. - ADAPT (306)
Disability Rag September/October 1987 RAGOUT WHAT'S COOKIN' [This article continues in ADAPT 305 but all the text has been included here for easier reading.] At the bottom of the page is a cute cartoon of a bus driving along crammed full of folks. “There's been more public discussion in 5 days than there’d been in 5 years" “Now we’re taken more seriously” —As time for ADAPT demonstrations in San Francisco draw near, this story of how one local disability group responded to the influx of ADAPT members from all over the country shows how ADAPT’s style of direct action can work with local disability groups more accustomed to working “within the system." - ed. When ADAPT members from all over the country began descending on Phoenix this spring to protest at the American Public Transit Association’s regional meeting, staff of the Arizona Bridge to Independent Living felt some anxiety over where our loyalties lay. The City of Phoenix had been receptive to the disability community. They'd purchased only accessible buses the last three years. Phoenix's Regional Public Transportation Association had spent hundreds of hours working with us. Yet we also knew from brief interaction with ADAPT that their strongly-worded opinions best expressed our frustration and anger at the system's unwillingness to commit to 100% accessibility. ABIL decided to work with both groups. Prior to their coming, we discussed with ADAPT the guidelines they’d follow in deciding what level of civil disobedience would be involved. We found ADAPT’s demand — that cities purchase only accessible buses in the normal course of replacing a fleet — a reasonable one. ADAPT wasn’t demanding bus systems retrofit their buses, or that they immediately replace all their buses with lift-equipped ones — just a long-term commitment to change. " A month before the APTA meeting, ABIL met with RPTA officials to discuss our and ADAPT's demands for accessibility. To our surprise, RPTA suggested their commitment be put in writing and adopted by their board! ADAPT was already having an effect — and they weren't even in town yet! The day before, ADAPT arrived. ABIL hosted a meeting for those disabled people from all over the community who were most likely to be contacted by media or others regarding the APTA/ADAPT confrontation. A consensus emerged that the disability community would maintain a united front; that the local community's interests were the same as ADAPT’s and that any public discussion beyond that — especially regarding ADAPT's "techniques" — would simply distract from the central issue: accessible mass transit. This single act of meeting and making these decisions was the thing most responsible for the success of our efforts. By spreading the word, we were able to keep from being forced into a public debate over the differences between persons with disabilities rather than focusing the debate on our common interest —- accessible public transit. Negative comments from a few individuals in the community were lost among the events of the next several days. ABIL found itself taking an increasingly larger role as protests and police reaction escalated, with some of us participating in the demonstrations, others calling politicians and media, putting pressure on local bureaucrats and helping to keep lines of communication open. The mayor of Phoenix, in the midst of the media barrage, made a public statement supporting the purchase of accessible buses. After APTA and ADAPT had left Phoenix, ABIL set up a meeting between the Mayor and local ADAPT members. It was the first time the Mayor had sat down with members of the disability community to discuss transportation. Although he and some transit system officials were still angry about the demonstrations, they were taking us more seriously. That's a tradeoff we’re willing to make. The ADAPT experience was a positive one for ABIL and the disability community in Phoenix. The events caused more public discussion about accessible public transit in those five days than there had been in Phoenix in the past five years. The longer the topic stayed in the news, the greater appreciation the public had for the need for accessible public transit. — Robert E. Michaels Executive Director Arizona Bridge to Independent Living, ABIL. - ADAPT (1767)
Wade Blank, from the waist up, wearing a black ADAPT Free Our People T-shirt. He has long - below the shoulder length - straight blonde hair parted in the middle, and he is wearing round tinted glasses. Behind him you can see the red and white stripes of the ADAPT flag. - Chronology of ADAPT Actions 2
[This is the second page of the chronological list of ADAPT actions] 2009 - April Washington DC; September Atlanta 2010 - April Washington DC; September Washington DC 2011 - Spring Washington DC; September Washington DC – My Medicaid Matters 2012 - Spring Washington DC; October Harrisburg, PA 2013 - April Washington DC; September Washington DC 2014 - Spring Washington DC; September Little Rock 2015 - Spring Washington DC; Fall Salt Lake City 2016 - Spring Washington DC; Fall Boston 2017 - Spring Washington DC; Fall Washington DC 2018 - Spring Washington DC; November Denver, CO - ADAPT (673)
Times Herald Record, Friday October 11, 1991 p. 36 Title: Heros for the handicapped? Militant group for disabled revels in its role of agitator The New York Times [compare with ADAPT 674 - the NYT clipping] ORLANDO. Fla. — The melee at a meeting of nursing home representatives here was in many ways a typical demonstration by members of Adapt. After smashing their wheelchairs into police barricades and blocking a hotel entrance, 73 members were arrested, creating front page headlines and a successful day’s work for the militant advocacy group for the disabled. The aim of the action last Sunday at the Peabody Hotel in this resort city was to locus attention on the organization's call to divert federal funds from nursing homes in a form of in-home care. But the means the group uses, like Sunday’s chaotic demonstration, has exasperated its allies often as much its adversaries. But even those who criticize Adapt acknowledge that the searing image of people with physical limitations engaging in civil disobedience often succeed in shattering stereo-types of how meek and pliant "cripples" are supposed to act - stereotypes often held by many disabled people themselves. “Adapt is about the issue," said Mary Johnson, editor of the Disability Rag, a weekly magazine that is devoted to disability issues. "But it is also about showing you that though you are disabled you have power already. For people who feel they don't have any power, who are often dependent, that is such a liberation." [Subheading] Antagonizing allies The Denver-based group’s style has drawn its share of criticism from other advocates for the disabled. These critics note that the group played little part in the negotiations thai led to the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act and that their methods have often antagonized allies in the struggle. “l think they do get attention," said a Washington-based disabled advocate who asked not to be identified. "But that‘s true when they are playing to an audience that is not politically savy. For people out in Middle America, sitting in front of the TV, seeing people in wheelchairs demonstrating is something new. But to folks in Washington who are used to sit-ins, it's passe." Leaders of Adapt, which originally stood for Americans Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation, say it is `groups` like theirs that push others to press forcefully for expanded rights for the disabled. “I think that even for the people with disabilities who don't participate directly in Adapt, we give them heart," said Diane Coleman, an Adapt organizer from Tennessee. And even those who sometimes criticize Adapt acknowledge that it is an effective weapon. It is a role Adapt readily takes on. “We make all the other `groups` seem real rational," said Mike Auberger, one of Adapt's founders and advocate who helped persuade the city to make all local buses accessible to people in wheelchairs. [Subheading] Drastic means to a questionable end Over the next few years they held protests over the issue of accessible public transportation in Cincinnati, ST Louis, Phoenix, Detroit and Atlanta. In addition to picketing, the protesters often would lock their wheelchairs together in front of city buses or chain themselves to a bus's bumper. Early on, Adapt made a prime target the American Public Transit Association, a group representing mass transit systems. The disabled advocates disrupted meetings and harassed officials of the group. "You have to have a bad guy in political organizing, somebody you can go after," said Auberger. These days that role is filled by the nursing home industry and Louis W. Sullivan, secretary of Health and Human Services. After Congress passed the Americans with Disabilities Act last year, requiring that all new buses be equipped with hydraulic lifts for people in wheelchairs, Adapt began protesting for federal subsidies for personal attendants, individuals hired by those with physical impairments to help them with basic everyday needs. Adapt wants 25 percent of the more than $20 billion paid to nursing home operators under the Medicaid program to he diverted from nursing homes to help the disabled pay for personal attendants. Though many mainstream advocates for the disabled have endorsed the goal of government subsidies for attendants, the diversion of funds sought by Adapt is opposed by the American Health Care Association, the trade group for nursing homes, and by the Bush administration. As a result, Adapt has spent the last few months harassing the nursing home association and Sullivan. This spring they blocked his car during a visit to Chicago and heckled him during a speech in Washington. in August, a handful of Adapt members rolled their wheelchairs along side Sullivan and haranged him as he participated in a fitness walk on Martha's Vineyard. Whether such methods will achieve Adapt’s stated goals is uncertain. But leaders of the group say that when they first began to put pressure on the public transportation industry, no one felt their methods would bear fruit. "You have to give complete and utter credit for that to Adapt," said Evan Kemp. Jr., the head at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. - ADAPT (475)
PHOTO by Tom Olin: A crowd of ADAPT protesters in various items of Revolutionary War Patriots garb surround the Liberty Bell. Park Rangers stand on either side of the bell. A man in a manual wheelchair wearing a wig and rainbow suspenders sits with his back to the camera, a Disabled But Able to Vote bumper sticker across the back of his chair. Bob Kafka in a colonial jacket and tri-cornered hat faces the camera, to his left Mike Auberger is talking with a person with a small child on their hip. In the center of the picture, partially obscuring the Liberty Bell is a poster that reads "We Need to Get There Too!!" In the background green trees can be seen through a huge plate glass window. - ADAPT (218)
A photo (by Tom Olin?): A group of demonstrators, some using wheelchairs, seem to be waiting by the side of the road. Three posters are readable: "ACCESSIBLE TRANSPORTATION NOW!" and "APTA OPPRESSES." Diane Coleman sits on the left side of the picture holding a CAPH (California Association of the Physically Handicapped) sign, beside her a woman stands, hands on her hips, behind her an attendant is standing. Beside her Tom Pugh sits in a manual wheelchair, and on his other side Frank McColm is also in a manual chair looking over his shoulder to his right. Standing behind and beside Frank, slightly behind the APTA Oppresses sign Wade Blank stands with his arms crossed in front of his ADAPT T-shirt. Beside him is another person standing. On the far right in the very front Beverly Furnice reclines in her chair looking off to her left with an unreadable sign in her lap. - ADAPT (561)
Thur., March 15, 1990 Rocky Mountain News GREATER DENVER & THE WEST * 19 Denver disabled keep pressure on at U.S. Capitol By John Brinkley News Washington Bureau WASHINGTON — A Denver-based group of disabled people continued its pressure on the U.S. Capitol yesterday, converging on the office of a congressman whom the demonstrators said was opposed to their agenda. The congressman, Rep. Bud Shuster, R-Pa., was not in. An aide refused to tell them where he was and said he would not be back in his office yesterday or today. Some of the disabled people vowed to camp out there until he returned. Michael Auberger, a 35-year-old quadriplegic from Denver, who co-founded American Disabled for Accessible Transportation, said Shuster had introduced legislation to exempt cities with fewer than 200,000 residents from having to equip mass transit buses with wheelchair lifts. If the exemption were enacted, “you're really screwed if you live in a city of 199,999,” Auberger said. Shuster also sponsored legislation to exempt cities that have “inclement weather," such as Denver, he said. “The transportation system in Denver could say, ‘we're not going to provide any m'ore lift-equipped transportation. We don't have to,’ ” Auberger said. “That's a major issue, because not everybody lives in the Sun Belt." Shuster’s administrative assistant, Ann Eppard, said she could neither confirm nor deny that Shuster had sponsored such legislation, and said the aide who would know was not in, either. The “visit” to Shuster’s office continued a week of often-militant protest by hundreds of ADAPT members, most of them in wheelchairs, from across the country. Their main purpose has been to push for quick passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act, which would extend a broad range of civil rights protections to disabled people. The House Energy and Commerce Committee passed the bill, 40-3, on Tuesday as 104 of the disabled people were being arrested and jailed for unlawful entry and demonstrating in the capitol. The Senate passed its version of the bill last year. The arrestees, including Auberger, were released later with orders to appear in Court today. Auberger said his group was also concerned about the Bush administration's position that disabled people should not be entitled to punitive damages when filing discrimination suits against businesses that fail to accommodate them. Legislation is pending that would afford them that right, and Attorney General Dick Thornburgh has told Congress that the administration opposes it. “I think it's unfortunate that this administration doesn't want to see disabled rights equal with other minority rights,” Auberger said. Without the threat of punitive damages, “there's no incentive for a business to end discrimination.” - ADAPT (502)
THIS IS A CONTINUATION OF THE ARTICLE IN ADAPT 492. See ADAPT 492 for the complete story. - ADAPT (556)
Cover of the magazine Habilitation! there is a line of only partially readable text:something Research and something Coalition The picture which fills the cover is of a crowd of people with various disabilities sitting in wheelchairs, 15 people are visable but it seems they are just a part of a much bigger crowd. Most are ADAPT members wearing various ADAPT T-shirts, one fellow has a white button down shirt and tie. Facing the camera, they are cheering and clapping . At the bottom of the picture six more people, again apparently part of a much larger group, face the rest, backs to the camera. In the center Justin Dart sits sideways to the camera. He is wearing his signature hat, black rimmed glasses, a coat and tie; in his lap are papers and he is holding something like a pen in one hand. He appears to be addressing the crowd around him. Directly behind him, her back to his back, stands a short woman who appears to be a sign language interpreter. - ADAPT (594)
El Paso Times 2-16-89 Editorials [Headline] Court decision right The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling requiring wheelchair lifts on all new public buses has long been needed. The tragedy is that it takes court rulings to force many public operations to provide for the disabled. For once, El Paso is ahead of the order. According to bus system officials, all buses on order will have the lifts, which add about $15,000 to a bus’ price. An average bus costs about $200,000. El Paso's attempts at meeting needs for the disabled — separate minivans and buses — have been far from adequate. Reservations had to be made at least a day in advance and buses often only could be used for the basic necessities, such as trips for food and to the doctor. For a long time, evening rides were not available. People in wheelchairs had to depend on friends to get to a movie, theater or any kind of recreation. And too often, that meant no pleasure trips at all. Credit tor this recent court win goes to the Americans Disabled For Accessible Public Transportation, who filed the class-action lawsuit. El Paso has an active chapter of ADAPT. Its members have not been shy in pointing out barriers. Monday's court victory is an important step in eliminating one of those barriers. - ADAPT (544)
Photo by Tom Olin: A man (Dorian Smothers) in a motorized wheelchair sits with his hands in his lap, with a pensive look on his face as he looks down to his left. Two policemen hold onto his wheelchair and others stand behind them. Behind them several protesters stand between police cars. - ADAPT (559)
Rocky Mtn. News Local Briefs [Headline] Wheelchair-lift issue in court’s lap, lawyer says U.S. Attorney Michael Norton yesterday told a group of disabled activists that the federal government’s appeal of a court ruling on bus wheelchair lifts was out of his hands. Norton appeared before 40 wheelchair-bound members of ADAPT, American Disabled for Access to Public Transit, who had camped several hours outside his 12th floor offices in Denver’s federal building. ADAPT members are angry about an appeal by the U.S. Justice Department on behalf of the Department of Transportation. The appeal seeks to overturn a federal court ruling requiring all local transit buses to be equipped with wheelchair lifts. Thirty protesters were arrested Monday for blocking the doors of the Radisson Hotel, where their target, the Urban Mass Transportation Administration, was holding a conference. - ADAPT (491)
Photo only. Photo by Tom Olin Picture of the lobby of the Russell federal building filled with ADAPT protesters in wheelchairs and standing. Two sides of the room are floor to ceiling glass windows and doors. People are scattered about in small groups. Outside it is daytime, inside the lights are on. - ADAPT (326)
Arizona Republic 4/17/87 Photo (whole right of the page) by Peter Schwepker/Republic: A small woman [Mary Ann Collinsworth] braces her legs to pull another woman [Katie Hoffman] in an airport style manual wheelchair across some rough terrain. Katie is holding the arm rests of the chair. Caption: Mary Ann Collinsworth helps Katie Hoffman maneuver across rocks as the Denver women head for a protest at the Mansion Club) Title: 5 Protesters Arrested for Wheelchair Honking By J.F. Torrey The Arizona Republic [This is an article that appears in ADAPT 326 and 325, but the entire text has been included here for easier reading.] Excessive wheelchair horn-honking led to disorderly conduct arrests of five members of the American Disabled for Accessible Public Transit on Monday afternoon in front of the downtown Phoenix Hyatt Regency. The arrests came from a frustrating morning for members of the group, which is in the city to protest the policies of the American Public Transit Association. The association is holding its annual Western meeting at the Hyatt. ADAPT would like to see the association, a trade group of public-transit-system officials, adopt a policy recommending that all public buses be equipped with lift systems to accommodate wheelchair-bound passengers. The arrests began at 3:41 p.m. after ADAPT members refused to stop blowing the horns on their electric wheelchairs. Four of the five people arrested were arrested Sunday at another demonstration. Phoenix police Lt. Ted McCreary led a half-dozen plainclothes officers over to the group of horn blowers, who were at the northern end of a line of 48 wheelchairs and a baby carriage that the protesters had assembled in front of the Hyatt. The group had spent more than an hour chanting and singing outside the hotel when McCreary made the attempt to silence the horns, which had been blowing intermittently during the demonstration. As police closed in, the original group stopped blowing the horns, only to be surrounded by other demonstrators in wheelchairs who began blowing theirs. Police eventually identified a demonstrator they planned to arrest, only to be surrounded by the rest of the demonstrators in wheelchairs, an action that made it difficult for police to move the suspect to a waiting lift-equipped van. McCreary later expressed frustration at the problems involved in policing the demonstration. "None of this is ever good,” he said. “We’re never in a winning position.” One of those arrested, Marilyn Golden, 33, of Oakland, California, complained that police had broken an agreement reached with ADAPT members in Monday’s arrests. “We were told that if we were going to be arrested, we would be warned,” Golden said. “I wasn’t, and I don’t even know what they’re arresting me for.” Sergeant Ken Johnson, a police spokesman, said he was not aware of the agreement to provide a warning. “Certainly there is no legal requirement that we give a warning,” Johnson said. “Maybe she couldn’t hear it because of the horns.” Earlier in the day, at a demonstration at the Mansion Club near the Arizona Biltmore Hotel, Sergeant Brad Thiss, another police spokesman, expressed similar sentiments as nearly 30 plainclothes officers approached a group of demonstrators who were attempting to block access to a luncheon of spouses of association members. When asked why only a few officers were in uniform, Thiss replied, “We’re trying to soften our image a little bit. Of course, how can you soften your image in wheelchairs into vans and arresting them?” The Mansion Club luncheon protest did not result in any arrests because those attending walked to the restaurant. ADAPT organizer Mike Auberger said that the protest achieved its goal because no buses passed the group’s line. “We want the function to go on as it would,” Auberger said. “We just want the people to experience the same convenience that handicapped individuals do.” After a brief standoff at a bridge over a Salt River Project canal, Auberger led the group back to a parking lot at the Biltmore Hotel where they surrounded a Phoenix Transit Authority bus they believed was to take association spouses back downtown. The bus turned out to be a decoy, and the spouses took a second bus back to the Hyatt. Thiss said the department will not calculate the expense of policing the convention until it is over. “For now, all I can say is the costs are enormous,” he said. Police arrested 26 ADAPT members Sunday for trespassing at Rustler’s Rooste, a southeast Phoenix restaurant where association members were attending a banquet. Those arrested were released later after being given a written citation. One protester, Clarence Miller, whose age and address were unavailable, was arrested for one count of aggravated assault on a police officer, a felony, and booked into Maricopa County Jail. ADAPT’s Auberger said Miller was required to post $1,370 in bail before being released Monday. Auberger, who said Miller is retarded, faulted the arrest.