Harkin & Davis to Introduce Community Choice

With thousands of people across the country listening in by phone, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Rep. Danny Davis (D-IL) will introduce the Community Choice Act (CCA) in both houses of Congress on March 24.

The CCA will allow people with disabilities and older people to choose to stay in their own homes and communities with attendant care instead of being forced into nursing homes and other institutions by the current institutional bias in Medicaid. Both President Obama and Vice President Biden were CCA co-sponsors during their years in the Senate.

“We are ver y hopeful that CCA will become reality this year” said Mike Oxford, Kansas ADAPT Organizer. “In the time since it was first introduced, our persistent efforts have resulted in securing Medicaid systems change grants, increased money for community services, and the Money Follows the Person grants. We’ve convinced a variety of federal and state officials that home care is personally preferable and fiscally responsible. All that’s left is to make home and community-based services and supports available across the nation so individuals in every state can choose to receive long term care at home in the community.”

Under current Medicaid law, states have to fund care in a nursing facility, but are not mandated to also fund the same care in a person’s own home. As a result, many people in need of long term care services and supports are literally forced to enter nursing homes or other institutional settings in order to receive the care they need. This inequality in where services are funded is known as the “institutional bias” in Medicaid.

“The introduction ceremony on March 24th will come just before the 10th anniversary of the noted U.S. Supreme Court ‘Olmstead Decision,’” said Dawn Russell, ADAPT Organizer in Denver, CO. “In Olmstead the court said forced
institutionalization is discrimination, and the court also reinforced the mandate in the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) that government services must be delivered in the “most integrated setting.”

Since 1997 when the CCA was introduced as the Medicaid Community-based Attendant Services Act (MiCASA), a variety of time-limited, state-option grants have provided funding for some older and disabled people to move from nursing homes back into the community. The CCA would keep people from having to go into a nursing home in the first place in order to get funding to live in the community.

“Whether you talk to the disability community or to AARP and other aging organizations, the message is both clear and consistent,” said Chris Hilderbrant, ADAPT Organizer from Rochester, NY. “People want to stay in their own homes and communities. They do no t want to be forced into a nursing home, away from family and friends, because they need some assistance in their daily lives. The situation in rural, frontier and tribal America is even more drastic because nursing homes are typically located miles and miles and hours and hours away from someone’s home community.”

When asked how the CCA fits into health care reform, Oxford added, “We want CCA to pass in 2009, whether as a stand alone bill, as part of a larger long-term services and supports reform, or as part of the Obama Administration’s health care reform package. Obama and Congress must end the institutional bias in 2009.”

ADAPT Press Release
March 10, 2008
www.adapt.org

RELATED STORIES

• Community Choice Act National Kickoff Draws Thousands
• Holdsworth & Salandra: An Alternative to Institutions
• President Barack Obama on Disability Rights
• Sen. Harkin Praises NCDR’s Road To Freedom
• Steve Gold: Medicaid Reductions and People with Disabilities
• “Special” Edition: President Obama and Special Olympics
• Support Community Choice Act
• Massachusetts: Bus on Journey for Disability Rights
• Public Radio: Freedom Bus in Amherst, MA
• Rochester, NY: Exhibit Displays Disability Struggle

LATEST NEWS HEADLINES

• California Disability Activists Hail State Supreme Court Ruling
• Illinois Disability Groups Speak Out Against Budget Cuts
• Doctors Fight Labeling Obesity a Disability
• Community Choice Act National Kickoff Draws Thousands
• “Special” Edition: President Obama and Special Olympics

ACTION ALERTS

Support Community Choice Act

The ADAPT Community wants you to Kick-Off the Introduction of the Community Choice Act on on March 24th!  We want YOU to celebrate the introduction of the most important health care reform for people with disabilities in this country — Community Choice Act!

We intend to give all of you the opportunity to be connected directly to the chamber [...]

OPINIONS

Disability 101: I Have A Voice

STATE NEWSWIRE

• Nondisabled Job Seekers Taking Jobs of Disabled
• Insurance Change for Veterans Is Scrapped
• United Airlines to Pay $850,000 for Disability Discrimination
• President Obama Addresses Disability Rights at LA Town Meeting
• President Obama “Jokes” About Special Olympics on Tonight Show
• Ginsburg Hints at Supreme Court Vacancy ‘Soon’