On December 14, 2018 North Central PA ADAPT went – yet again – to Congressman Tom Marino’s office in Williamsport PA.
For over a year NCPA ADAPT has tried to meet with Congressman Marino to secure his support for disabled and elderly Americans to live in freedom in the community. Not only has the Congressman avoided us at scheduled appointments with him, but has also broke his promises to us as a group and to individuals in our group about sitting down and meeting with him.
Every now and then his DC staff will pretend to work with us and “promise to get us the Congressman’s response” to our demands, but at every turn his staff stop responding and continue to ignore us.
On Friday, December 14th we decided enough is enough! It’s time for Congressman Marino to know that NCPA ADAPT Demands his support!
Disabled constituents are just as much constituents as anyone else and it’s time for him to work with us!
Since his staff in the Williamsport office were not willing to at least get Marino on the phone, 10 NCPA ADAPT Activist sat inside his office chanting:
“Who do we want? Marino! When do we want him? Now!”
“Marino, Marino come on out – ADAPT has something to talk about!”
while two of our other ADAPTers handed out flyers to people coming out of Planet Fitness and informed the public why we were “disrupting” their workout. Nearly every passerby was in support of our demands.
After two hours of chanting Congressman Marino had the Williamsport Police show up to tell us we were “trespassing.” It was only noon and the office was clearly open, since it’s a public entity, he is Our Congressman, and we weren’t going anywhere – we called the cops bluff. We stayed chanting for another half hour while the cops stood outside tapping their hands to the beat of our chanting.
Congressman Marino is well aware that we were in his office, and who knows, maybe he was hiding in the back like he has in the past. We decided to save of our ADAPT Power for future follow up, so before heading out for the day we made sure his staffers heard that all he has to do is respond to us – otherwise ADAPT will be back.
We let it known that all we want this Holiday Season is for our Congressman to stop being a Grinch, and give the gift of SHOWING his support for our right to live in the community and not in institutions.
North Central PA ADAPT Demands:
Congressman Marino show us his support by:
- Committing to sponsor Money Follows the Person legislation in the 116th Congress
- Committing to sponsor the Disability Integration Act in the 116th Congress
- Meet with North Central PA ADAPT!