| Speech by Governor Kulongoski |
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| October 25, 2004 |
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Elder Abuse Press Conference
REMARKS BY GOVERNOR TED KULONGOSKI
October 25, 2004
Thank you for inviting me here today. I would like to thank the City of Beaverton and Washington County for hosting this event. Specifically, I would like to recognize Washington County District Attorney, Bob Hermann; Sheriff Rob Gordon; Circuit Court Judge Rick Knapp; Beaverton Mayor Rob Drake; Beaverton Police Chief Dave Bishop; and Mary Lou Ritter, Director of Disability, Aging and Veteran’s Services; Mike Paul, Umpqua Bank and Chairman of the Oregon Bankers Association; for their leadership on this important issue.
The subject we are here to discuss today is an important one. It involves thousands of older Oregonians every year - elder abuse and neglect. Historically, this issue hasn’t received the attention from our communities and governments that it demands.
As Oregon’s Attorney General, I established a statewide task force on elder abuse because it was clear to me that not enough was being done to address what many refer to as the “third leg on the family violence triangle” – the other legs being child abuse and partner-spousal abuse.
Prior to 2000, responding to and identifying the abuse or neglect of older Oregonians was difficult because our state lacked a system of coordinated assistance from law enforcement, prosecutors and state and county protective services that applied to domestic or child abuse.
The establishment of the Attorney General’s Task Force in 1994 helped highlight this gap and the work of the task force has resulted in better coordination among Governmental agencies to prevent and respond to crimes committed against our older citizens.
Under the leadership of our current Attorney General, Hardy Myers, this task force has continued to make progress in not only preventing the victimization of our elderly, but also in holding those accountable who commit crimes against older Oregonians.
Over the last decade, our police and prosecutors have strengthened their coordination and collaboration so that perpetrators are punished and put behind bars.
In the private sector – like our partners in the financial institution community – have also responded to our call and have stepped up with providing training of their staff so we can better identify and prevent victimization of the elderly before it occurs.
We have also worked to establish multi-disciplinary teams in every county in order to achieve better coordination at the state, local and community levels. Our objective is to ensure that our senior citizens are healthy and safe and live out their lives with the dignity and respect they deserve.
While we as a state have made great progress over the last ten years, our work can never stop. When I took office as Governor, I continued to place the safety of our citizens as a top priority.
As I work to develop my recommended budget for the 2005-07 biennium, one of my six Oregon Principles, which are guiding my decision-making process – is the principle that Oregonians are safe in their homes, communities and in state institutions.
Earlier this year, I initiated a comprehensive review of our state’s public safety system. That review resulted in a task force on sentencing and a task force addressing the methamphetamine crisis. I also directed that effort to include a review of our efforts to protect our most vulnerable seniors, which resulted in the Elder Abuse Task Force.
We invited experts from around the state – from the law enforcement community to the judicial branch to the medical and social service providers, to our Native American community – and asked them to identify the various types of elder abuse and neglect.
I charged them to examine our efforts to prevent elder abuse of all kinds and report back to me with recommendations on what we can do as a state to strengthen protection for Oregon's older citizens.
I want to acknowledge the work of this task force and thank them for assuming this responsibility and producing this report of recommendations.
And that’s why we are here today – to talk about some of those recommendations.
I will act on some immediately while others may need a more thorough review consistent with our new budget process.
The real purpose today is to look at what we can do immediately with little cost to enhance our system that protects our older citizens, and then our next step is to look ahead toward legislative action that could further support our ability to protect our elders.
Here are several recommendations I plan to pursue:
The Department of Human Services will develop a quick response process to expedite criminal background checks to reduce the current backlog of those waiting resolution of their background status. Additionally, I expect the Department to strengthen guidelines to those caregivers who are hired before criminal background checks are completed so that they have closer supervision until their check is cleared.
The creation of a criminal history registry by the state to immediately alert care-providers if an applicant has been identified as someone who has a criminal record. This system would eliminate the need for duplicate criminal background checks and provide warning indicators for those that seek employment in other related care-providing fields.
Working in partnership with the Oregon Bankers Association, and their president Tom Perrick, we will offer renewed training for front-line banking staff on the indicators and prevention measures regarding financial exploitation of the elderly.
The OBA has a long history of working on this issue and because of these trainings, front-line banking staff have stopped the financial exploitation of seniors in dozens of cases. Financial exploitation remains the number one form of reported elder abuse and literally, each year in Oregon, criminals drain hundreds of thousands of dollars from the bank accounts of older Oregonians.
The financial institutions in this state can be a valuable partner in our efforts to protect vulnerable Oregonians from this sort of crime.
Working with the long-term care industry, and the Home Health Care Commission, we will develop a best practices curriculum and training video to teach proper care giving techniques and at the same time alert caregivers of the early signs of elder abuse. Part of that training will be about reporting elderly abuse to the proper authority. Proper reporting to law enforcement could literally be the difference between life and death.
Finally, the Task Force has offered several changes to Oregon law that could result in better protecting our most vulnerable older adults.
As we look ahead, I will look at the task force recommendation about this omnibus bill that would change statutory language to better protect older Oregonians. This bill, called the Oregon Elder Justice Act of 2005, could add further protections for our seniors and send a clear message to perpetrators that justice will be served to those who victimize our elders. Again, I will be working with my staff, the legislature, and community activists on this legislative idea.
Whether it is the children who are just starting out in life or our elderly community who have enriched this state so much, I believe that these recommendations are part of the history of Oregon doing more to protect our own.
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