Scranton will soon become home to the state’s first Older Adult Advocacy Center.
Pennsylvania Aging Secretary Jason Kavulich joined Lackawanna County Area Agency on Aging executive director Sara McDonald, Telespond Senior Services, Inc. president and CEO Helen Schmid and the center’s director Cliff Miller for a ribbon cutting ceremony at the site of the brand new center on Friday.
The center should be fully operational by the end of this month, officials said.
The first of its kind facility, housed at Telespond Senior Services in Scranton, will serve older adults who are victims of abuse or neglect with resources including transitional housing for up to four people at a time, if needed.
Telespond was chosen as the location because it already provides services to older adults, such as an adult day center, and has a convenient location off of Interstate 81.
“This Advocacy Center is completely designed to be person-centered, which means that it's based on the person that we're serving,” Kavulich said. “Whether they need senior companion services or adult day services, whether they need transportation or they need legal services, victims advocacy services, that can all happen here in one place where they are staying, where they're safe, where they have dignity and respect, and where they have a group of individuals devoted to making them as whole as possible, despite the fact that they've been victimized.”
Telespond also will manage and run the center. It's funded through the Older Adult Protective Services budget, which is money the county receives from the state's Department of Aging, McDonald explained. Money from the Federal Victim of Crime Act through the state's Commission on Crime and Delinquency funds the center's transitional housing. In the future, the center plans to explore the use of money from the Pennsylvania Housing Affordability and Rehabilitation Enhancement Fund.
The Advocacy Center will serve Lackawanna, Luzerne, Wyoming, Carbon, Monroe, Pike and Wayne counties.
Older adults will need to be referred to the center through an Area Agency on Aging. So far, only Lackawanna County's agency is contracted to refer people, but Luzerne/ Wyoming counties' joint agency will soon follow.
Leading the state
Kavulich said Allegheny and Philadelphia counties have already expressed interest in replicating the center.
“The Northeast is leading the two biggest cities in Pennsylvania in what we've developed here for our communities,” Kavulich said.
The center has been in the works for a few years. Kavulich brainstormed the idea back in 2018, when he worked as the director of Lackawanna County’s Area Agency on Aging.
Kavulich is happy to finally make his dream a reality in Northeast Pennsylvania. He’s proud that the Scranton-based center will now serve as a state model.
“We get stuff done in the Northeast better than most,” Kavulich said.
The need for protective services
Pennsylvania has the fifth largest population of older adults in the country. According to AARP, in just the next five years, one in three Pennsylvanians is expected to be 60 or older.
Kavulich said with the continuous growth of that population, there’s a need to invest in protective services.
“Right now, financial exploitation has taken over as the number one reported need in older adult protective services for the first time in our history. We need new resources. We need new ideas. We needed an investment in older adults all across Pennsylvania if we're going to push back on this problem,” he said.
Miller stepped into his role as director of the Advocacy Center last year. He looks forward to welcoming the first guest and getting victims of abuse back on their feet.
“From the beginning, we recognized that older adults experiencing elder abuse and in need of short term transitional safe spaces face unique and complex challenges to help them return home and remain there safely and securely,” Miller said.
McDonald sees the center as an opportunity to better serve the region’s older adults in her role at the Area Agency on Aging.
“The Older Adult Advocacy Center fills a critical gap in our community in response to the growing number of older adult protective services reports investigated statewide," McDonald said. “This solution-focused resource, will not only offer older adults a temporary place to stay, but will support both older adults and Area Agency on Aging caseworkers by providing person centered resource navigation and education to older adults with the shared goal of reducing recidivism among the older adults in need of protective services.”
