By Sheldon Spackman

Community conversation on elder abuse in central Alberta

Aug 31, 2018 | 7:10 AM

Local service providers will gather in Sylvan Lake next month to address the issue of elder abuse in central Alberta.

Hosted by the Sylvan Lake and Area Community Coordinated Response (CCR) to Elder Abuse Committee, the third annual Central Alberta Community Conversation on Abuse of Older Adults will take place at the Sylvan Lake Family and Community Centre on September 18.

Allyssa Bremner, Community Facilitator for Innisfail FCSS, says the hope is to stay up-to-date with the different trends, issues, challenges and tools that can move the community forward with respect to preventing the abuse of older adults.

“A lot of people that will be attending this event do sit on Community Coordinated Response Committees to elder abuse,” she explains. “It is a grant that came through the government to help rural communities put together an action plan for reducing elder abuse. The first two of these community conversations were put on by the Red Deer CCR by members of the Golden Circle and now they let another community take over this year.”

Bremner feels the issue of elder abuse is very prevalent in our society and needs to be addressed.

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“Just from local agencies like banks and RCMP members and other service providers like FCSS, it’s starting to come out more and more. It’s always been something that kind of hasn’t been talked about very much or people don’t necessarily think that it happens in their community.”

She feels many people aren’t always aware of the many types of abuse seniors can face.

“When I’ve gone and given presentations about elder abuse at seniors’ centres, I will often hear ‘That doesn’t happen in our town’,” says Bremner. “The biggest one is financial abuse. A lot of the time, the perpetrators of elder abuse are family members. People don’t always realize that that’s a type of abuse.”

She points out, however, that the CCR grant is only a three-year grant so a lot of service providers are now coming up to their three-year term.

“Not every community has the means to have someone in their organization fully take over to help out with elder abuse,” states Bremner. “Part of the grant was that it paid to have a coordinator help put everything together, so everyone needs to decide how they go forward with what they’ve been able to do in their communities so far.”  

Responding to elder abuse says Bremner, requires a different protocol in each community.

“(Sylvan Lake has) two forms of response. One of them is to call the senior services outreach worker that’s out of FCSS. She’s been able to take on elder abuse issues as part of her role and help do a little bit of investigating and filling out forms and helping them through the process of everything. When she’s not available, then Victim Services is the other point of contact.”

Bremner says the Sept. 18 event for local service providers will include guest speakers from Canada Revenue Agency, Government of Alberta, a pharmacist and a bank manager.

Bremner says their stats project there will be more than one million seniors aged 65 and over in Alberta by 2036, with elder abuse the most underreported crime of abuse and most commonly committed by family members, spouses or adult children.