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ADAPT Expresses Disgust with Service Employees International Union’s (SEIUs) Backstabbing
ADAPT has assembled at the SEIU’s headquarters to burn a copy of the guiding principles to demonstrate disgust at SEIU’s violation of a good faith partnership.
In November 2011, recognizing the interdependence of individuals with disabilities and the attendants who support them, SEIU and ADAPT developed guiding principles to govern our mutual efforts. These guiding principles recognized that the needs of labor and the disabled community are often mutually compatible and occasionally divergent. Accordingly, these guiding principles were developed and agreed upon to insure an effective and respectful relationship, particularly when interests diverge.
Recently, ADAPT became aware that SEIU supported proposed rules that undercut the availability of community-based services and would result in the unwanted institutionalization of people with disabilities, flagrantly violating these guiding principles and a commitment to ADAPT.
Persons with disabilities rely upon attendants for assistance with the most intimate tasks of their lives. It is therefore critical that individuals with disabilities develop close trusting relationships with their attendants. However, by mandating overtime for attendants in the absence of additional Medicaid funding, the (DOL) has effectively guaranteed that all intimate assistance in excess of 40 hours a week will be provided by strangers.
“Would you want someone you don’t know watching as you use the bathroom or be forced into an institution?” asked Denise McMullen-Powell. “That’s what will happen to people with disabilities when the SEIU supported overtime regulations go into effect.”
“We have been burned by SEIU and our relationship is up in smoke,” said Ms. McMullen-Powell, “So we are burning these now worthless guidelines.”
This is the third of four days of directed action by ADAPT in Washington DC.
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