This is Elder Abuse Awareness Month.

What sorts of elder abuse cases do we see in Humboldt County? How many? What does local government do to combat elder abuse, and what can you do to help?

Keri Schrock of the Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services’ Adult Protective Services’ division joins the Outpost’s John Kennedy O’Connor to talk about this things —

Video above, transcript below.

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O’CONNOR:

Well, welcome to another Humboldt Conversation. I’m really thrilled to say we’re here today with Keri Schrock, and Keri is the Adult Services Program Manager with the Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services. That’s quite a long title, quite a long mouthful. But we’re here today to talk about a very important program that’s coming up that you’ve been working on recently, which is the Elder Abuse Awareness Month and the day that’s coming up on the 15th. Now, this is something that when you sent us your press release, I was really actually very disturbed to read about the number of cases of abuse that your department is dealing with almost on a daily basis and certainly within a month. It’s very, very worrying.

SCHROCK:

And actually the number of reports that we get is not the number of abuse cases that are actually happening. Because elder abuse is underreported kind of everywhere. And elders are the fastest growing population right now. And we get reports every day that social workers are answering to.

O’CONNOR:

Which is really kind of concerning, but I immediately thought of physical abuse and emotional abuse, but it’s not, it’s financial abuse and all sorts of different things, including sexual abuse, which really disturbs me.

SCHROCK:

Yes, and in addition to those, there’s also neglect, there’s self-neglect, and there’s also neglect by others like a caretaker. And when you mentioned financial abuse, we actually have seen a rise in that the pandemic really had an effect on the older population. COVID just increased isolation and loneliness for elders who, they were the ones pretty much most at risk of complications or death from the pandemic. And so that caused them to be even more isolated and targeted a lot by people who were committing fraud.

O’CONNOR:

Now, your department works with a number of different social workers but also I believe some volunteers as well who are out in the community. How do you respond when you get a call of abuse?

SCHROCK:

Well, we take calls that come in. Sometimes they meet criteria, sometimes they don’t. But if somebody is concerned or even has a suspicion of abuse, they can call our hotline. The number is 476-2100. And then a social worker takes the call, they screen it. The information goes to a supervisor who will review the report and assign it if it meets criteria. And then the social worker will make contact and do an investigation and provide services. And a lot of people think that there’s some fear that a social worker is going to come out and maybe do some intervention that they don’t want. But really, the goal of Adult Protective Services is to keep people safe in their homes and honor their right to make their own decisions and self-determination. So we’re really there to be helpful. And to help them remain independent. 

O’CONNOR:

Now, there is this month happening right now in June 2023, which is an Elder Abuse Awareness Month. What programs are in place, what is happening this month to help people become aware of this situation?

SCHROCK:

We are doing additional outreach. We have staff that are at the Arcata Farmers’ Market. We have a booth there where we have information. Social workers can answer questions. We have coloring pages for children. The coloring pages are also available at the Eureka Library, the Humboldt County Library. We have a banner that is hung up, that will be hung up in Eureka as well as one in Arcata that just it gives our phone number and just says to honor our elders because we do want the focus to be on the issues of elder abuse but also to put some emphasis on really honoring this this really important part of our community because everybody will hopefully be an elder one day or loves an elder or or somebody a friend or a family member is an elder that needs to be looked after.

O’CONNOR:

Now, of course the community is very important to supporting your work in many respects because not only are they the eyes and ears of what might be happening but they can also protect their own loved ones who may be vulnerable to other influences.

SCHROCK:

Yes, yes. So ideally people will just having us out and about in the community a little bit more, people will think about somebody that they know, maybe a loved one, maybe a neighbor, just check in on people, check in on your elders, give people a call, reach out. A lot of times the signs might not be not might not be super visible. When you hear about abuse, you might think of bruises or injuries, but there’s also signs of somebody maybe who used to be very vibrant and out and about, a neighbor that you saw all the time that was friendly that now you notice maybe there’s someone new living in the home and that person, the elder looks now kind of unkempt and doesn’t really come to the door or just changes in behavior are some of the indicators of abuse.

O’CONNOR:

And there’s a specific National Awareness Day, isn’t there, for the entire nation, that’s on the 15th? Yes.

SCHROCK:

June 15th. I know that our banner will be up that day. I actually off the top of my head don’t know what day of the week that is. So I don’t know that we are doing something. Wednesday I think. Okay, okay. So I don’t think we’re doing anything extra specific on that day. We do have these purple ribbons. Purple is the color for elder abuse awareness. So we have ribbons available several places in the community and we also have those at the places we’re tabling.

O’CONNOR:

Yes, and I actually saw them when I arrived here today. You’ve got a little basket full of them, which has a little booklet as well of the signs to look for.

SCHROCK:

Uh huh, and our phone number to call and so you can grab one on your way out. I will do that. And yes, so we have a really good dedicated team of social workers and support staff. We actually are, we actually have some vacancies for openings so if somebody is interested in a job you can call 476-2100 you can ask to talk to me, Keri. We have openings in our supportive services program as well as with adult protective services. Well, thank you.

O’CONNOR:

If anybody wants to reach out, that’s the number from Keri. We’ll also put that on the screen as well. Keri, it’s been a pleasure to talk to you. It’s not an easy subject to discuss. And I really appreciate the work that your team are doing here. And I think people, you know, during this month will become more aware of what’s going on in their community and how they can help actually support your services.

SCHROCK:

Great.

O’CONNOR:

Well, Keri, it’s lovely to meet you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining us for a Humboldt Conversation. And join us for another one again very, very soon.