by Ruth Conniff

About the author: Ruth Conniff is the managing editor of the Progressive, a liberal monthly periodical.

On New Year’s Day, 1996, hundreds of disabled people in Wisconsin suddenly confronted the prospect of entering nursing homes. The state budget, passed in fall 1995, placed a cap on funding for community-based services, including personal-attendant care. On January 1, the state began enforcing the cap. Anyone whose home care costs more than the cap was directed to the nearest residential- care facility. This has caused a wave of fear and outrage among the disabled.

Capping Medicaid

“I was in a nursing home once, and believe me, I don’t ever want to be in one again,” says Steve Verridan, who suffered a spinal-cord injury in a diving accident. He now works at Access...