ADAPT's long climb towards equality

Wade Blank was a non-disabled Presbyterian minister who worked with Dr Martin Luther King on the civil rights struggle in the 1960s.

Burnt out as an activist in the 1970s, he found a job as youth worker/recruiter for a nursing home in Denver, Colorado.

The TV movie When You Remember Me depicts the horrendous abuse of young disabled people that took place and tells the story of how Wade (played by Kevin Spacey) helped 19 residents to break free, winning a lawsuit against the institution. This is where the film ends and the story of ADAPT begins.

Wade at first provided personal assistance to all 19 disabled people but once the lawsuit was settled, he founded one of the first centres for independent living in Denver, the Atlantis Community, which still exists today.

The first barrier that the young escapees encountered was transport. Wade and the gang of 19 soon realised they would be housebound if public transport was not accessible.

On 5 July, 1978, Wade and 19 disabled people stepped off the sidewalk at Colfax and Broadway in the centre of Denver and trapped a bus for three days. Atlantis continued to campaign until 1983, when the bus company agreed to purchase only accessible vehicles.

In 1983, ADAPT (the American Disabled for Accessible Public Transport) was born and staged its first national action in Denver, demanding that all disabled people could ride public transit.

The We Will Ride campaign lasted until 1990, winning victories throughout the USA and inspiring disabled people all over the world to use the tactics of non-violent civil disobedience to “boldly go where everyone else has been before”. It inspired the birth in the UK of the Campaign for Accessible Transport and subsequently the Disabled People’s Direct Action Network (DAN).

ADAPT played a crucial role in the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act 1990 (ADA), with disabled people crawling up the Capitol steps in Washington, DC, to ensure that the act was not watered down (pictured far left).

In 1990, with the ADA signed, ADAPT became the American Disabled for Attendant Programs Today, turning its energy to getting people out of nursing homes and supporting them in the community. They also stopped people going into these institutions.

Over the last 18 years, ADAPT has been directly responsible for tens of thousands of disabled people getting out of nursing homes and living in the community. ADAPT fights for the services and the housing needed so that all disabled people can live where they choose, with who they choose, and direct the assistance they need themselves.

With its unceasing advocacy at local, state and national levels, ADAPT is indirectly responsible for hundreds of thousands of disabled people living in the community rather than institutions.

On Valentine’s Day 2007, as a direct result of ADAPT’s advocacy and action, the US government passed into law legislation called Money Follows the Person. This law means that a person can use the money it costs to keep them in an institution and transfer it to buy services supporting them to live in the community. This will set free many more disabled people.

ADAPT is now campaigning for the Community Choice Act, which would end the bias of institutional care over home and community-based services. Currently, states have to provide institutional care but home and community-based services are optional. The act would force states to provide home and community-based services.

ADAPT’s victories have made a significant difference to disabled people, particularly at the sharp end of abuse in institutions, but perhaps their biggest victory is the fact that they have grown from a gang of 19 to average more than 500 people at national actions, with thousands of members and tens of thousands of supporters. They have also carried with them other organisations of disabled people in supporting their issues.

The hardest part of campaigning over a long period of time is being able to stay together and grow while keeping up the momentum. The UK movement could learn a lot from that. Happy birthday ADAPT and let’s Free Our People!

• For a detailed history of ADAPT, visit www.adapt25.org

• To hear songs from Alan’s new album, visit www.myspace.com/johnnycrescendo