Today is the 21st anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision in #Olmstead v. L.C. Many with disabilities have been made better off by the decision. The home of a woman with profound challenges whom I have volunteered with for years is threatened by misapplications of this case. 
In Olmstead, the Court held that qualified individuals with mental illness and developmental disabilities have a right to choose where they live — in a “community-based setting,” or in a (loaded term) “institution.” Some have used the Olmstead to remove, not expand, choice.
The decision is often framed as an “integration mandate” by people who zealously seek the closure of all facilities that they deem “institutions,” whether or not individuals or their guardians desire such closures.
These advocates assume that all campuses for individuals with disabilities, like the campus in my hometown where Sandra (above) lives, are “institutions,” and are prima facie oppressive. They argue Olmstead requires the closure of her home. This is a betrayal of the decision.
The majority: “We emphasize that nothing in the ADA or its implementing regulations condones termination of institutional settings ... Nor is there any federal requirement that community-based treatment be imposed on patients who do not desire it.”
Cont.: “As already observed...the ADA is not reasonably read to impel States to phase out institutions, placing patients in need of close care at risk...Nor is it the ADA’s mission to drive States to move institutionalized patients into an inappropriate setting...”
“For other individuals, no placement outside the institution may ever be appropriate...for these persons, institutional settings are needed and must remain available.”
“[community placement] is in order when the State’s treatment professionals have determined that community placement is appropriate, [it] is not opposed by the affected individual, and [it] can be reasonably accommodated taking into account [state $] and the needs of others....”
Justice Kennedy’s prescient concurrence: “It would be unreasonable, it would be a tragic event, then, were the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) to be interpreted so that States had some incentive, for fear of litigation...
... to drive those in need of medical care and treatment out of appropriate care and into settings with too little assistance and supervision.”
One good example of imperious Olmstead litigation was Ligas v. Eagelson, a class-action lawsuit filed by *nine* plaintiffs on behalf of *all 6,000 persons with disabilities in Illinois who lived in “institutional” settings.*
The suit was filed without consulting the individuals and families whose loved ones were “institutionalized.” The plaintiffs presumed that their very placement in a so-called “institution” violated the Olmstead decision.
More than 2500 individuals and families with loved ones in these “institutional” settings intervened in the lawsuit, and were able to prevent the closure of these facilities against they and their loved ones’ will.
Other families in other states were not so lucky. Without notifying residents of guardians, activists in PA filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court resulted in the closure of Western Center. Families and individuals were devastated.
Residents were shipped out of the facility in buses. Parents stood outside, devastated. One woman w/ profound autism tried to run and see her sister instead of getting on the bus, but was stopped by police, and handcuffed when she became violent:
Olmstead was about people having the choice to leave institutions if they did not want or need to be there. Everyone supports that. But forcibly closing settings that provide intensive supports in the name of civil rights wages war on the most vulnerable in our society.
Their*
