The Roving Activist’s Blog

I went back to DUH City last night. We had lots of housing related activities to keep us busy. We built the DUH City Library, and the Darling Disco complete with the silver ball. Lisa and Joe did security until 2:30, and I hung out talking with folks until about 1:30 or so, when my body gave out on me, and I couldn’t stay awake any longer. I did get some sleep, but not enough, that’s for sure!

When daylight came, we cleaned up, and got ready to welcome everyone back to DUH City. we began chanting loudly, “our homes. not nursing homes”, and “accessible, affordable, integrated housing!” Amber came and delivered today’s edition of the DUH City Times.

As the rest of the folks came up the street, we got even louder! Simultaneously, Yoshiko Dart, and some other folks came with a nice continental breakfast of bagels, croissants, and fresh juices. Just the scent of the fresh breads wafting gently through the air gave me the energy to keep chanting loud and strong! I had a couple of bites of croissant, and some juice, then, joined the leadership team for a meeting.

After the meeting, the orange team went back to the hotel. I showered, and tried to get some sleep. My mum called. Many of you know that my mum is an ADAPT member who has been arrested a few times on local actions in Colorado. She lives in Tacoma, WA, now, but she wanted to let me know that she has been following us on the Internet, and participating by doing the call-ins.

I have a twitter account, so I was able to keep up with the wild adventures that the blue, green, and purple teams have been on. The police were so nervous about us that they attempted to stop ADAPT several times, and we even had to negotiate paths, goings, etc. with the cops. That hasn’t happened since the old days! Once we got to the Capitol, we hit the offices of Senators Dodd, Shelby, and Representative Barney Frank. Each of these lawmakers either chair, or serve on committees having to do with housing. In fact, ADAPT has met with Barney Frank in the past. ADAPT wants each of these folks to endorse the housing platform, and sign a letter of support.

Of course, these politicians would not give their support, and almost immediately began having our people arrested. A call-in to each of the offices was initiated to get support of the platform. Sen. Dodd’s office immediately put their phones on automatic after hours messaging, but people were able to leave messages. Sen. Shelby and Rep. Frank’s staff began losing their cool when the calls became overwhelming. You can still call. Here are the numbers:

Rep. Barney Frank

202-225-5931

Sen. Chris Dodd

202-224-2823

Sen. Richard Shelby

202-224-5744

The hit on Sen. Dodd’s office was particularly long. There is a staffer named Jenn Fogel-Bublick who is holding up progress, and standing in the way of things. She says that the senator supports the housing platform but though she has the authority to do so, won’t sign the support letter. Here is her number and e-mail:

Jenn Fogel-Bublick

202-224-2336

e-mail

jenn_fogel-bublick@banking.senate.gov

Please keep calling and e-mailing these folks! They would rather arrest our folks than work with ADAPT. 47 of us have been arrested Tell them how important accessible, affordable, integrated housing is to people with disabilities. Ask them to sign the letter of support and endorse the ADAPT Housing Platform!

I’m signing off now, and going back to DUH City! FREE OUR PEOPLE!!!  

I am back at the hotel trying to unwind and post this. I imagine that my Gentle Readers would like to know why I am back at the hotel when a butt-kicking ADAPT action is going on. Well, I am part of the Orange gteam, whose duty is to be available for night duty, so we are supposed to be relaxing, charging our chairs, and otherwise taking it easy until later.

Now, back to the morning. We crept out of here at about 4:15 am on a stealth mission to our target-none other than the Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD.

Can you imagine 500 ADAPT members being quiet? Let me tell you, it was quiet as the tombs! When we hit the HUD plaza, it was all about business. Our team of builders immediately set to building structures that looked similar to Quonset huts. In fact, they built a whole little city-DUH City-in record time! Amazingly, there were no police in sight, and HUD security, being a little out of it, and certainly not expecting folks at their doorstep at 4:30 am, took a few minutes to figure out what was going on. They then sent out one lone security officer, who stepped on the piping, thinking that he was going to stop our builders from completing their task, but bouyed up by thunderous chants and cheers from their fellow ADAPT members, they simply built around him. The poor guy must have felt really stupid being out ther alone with no backup, and clearly being ineffective. I know if it were me, I’d have been pretty red in the face!

After we finished setting up, we annouced what was going on to the ADAPT crowd, and read some of the ADAPT Housing Platform. Then, several folks told their story about how the lack of accessible, affordable, integrated housing affected them.

The police eventually came, but decided that since we were not blocking anything, they would not do anything to us. I can tell you, HUD was jittery-so much so that they locked and barricaded their doors even though we were nowhere near them!

Meanwhile, our Media Team delivered copies of the Duh City Times to every member of Congress (the House and the Senate) so that they will be educated about the crisis in housing among people with disabilities.

Finally, after our press conference, HUD officials set up a meeting, which we did not ask for, but the leadership team went and met with serveral HUD officials, and it was clear to me that they had nothing to offer, and really couldn’t do anything. The meeting was a waste of time.

After that, my team, the orange team, returned to the hotel, since we will be back later. Three teams then left on some rather cool adventures, which are still taking place as I type. One team hit the Democratic National Committee, and two teams hit the office of Senator McCain. Of course, his staff refused to forward the Housing Platform to the senator, but you can help. Call 703-297-8900 and ask them to forward ADAPT’s Housing Platform to Senator McCain!

Duh City has a website-http://www.duhcity.org/ Check it out, and learn about what’s happening every day!

I’ll keep you posted. See you later!