Senior Service Provider Network
Marquette County service providers catering to seniors told a state panel today that the strong relationship they have with each other is a model for the entire state to follow.
The Michigan Commission on Services to the Aging had a meeting in Marquette today.
Marquette County has a senior provider network.
It started three years ago when various providers realized they didn’t know what the others in the area were up to.
AMCAB is part of the Marquette County Senior Provider Network, and Lori Stephens-Brown of AMCAB says the existence of the network means various groups no longer duplicate elder services that one another provide.
She says it means providers of elder services can use their dwindling budgets more efficiently than they could before they started the network.
Since 2009, the provider network has turned a great deal of attention to the subject of elder abuse.
It also wants to make some of their services appear to be less scary.
Ruth Almen of the Alzheimer’s Association says the ideas of hospice and Alzheimer’s case can be intimidating to people who aren’t fully familiar with them.
She says the network is spreading community awareness of those types of services.
The Commission on Services to the Aging has 15 members who are appointed by the governor.
Former Marquette mayor Jerry Irby is one of those 15 members.
The group meets once a month, and it tries to meet somewhere in the Upper Peninsula at least once a year.