The King County Long Term Care Ombudsman Program (KCLTCOP) is an independent organization. It and similar programs were created nationally by the Federal Older Americans Act.
The Program works closely with the Department and of Social and Health Services (DSHS) and community groups to achieve its goals – namely to ensure the rights of the residents of long-term care facilities. These facilities are licensed by the DSHS and are known as nursing homes, assisted living facilities or adult family homes.
On June 24, 28 volunteers from the KCLTCOP visited over 80 adult family homes in the city of Bellevue to acquaint owners, staff, and especially residents of these facilities with the objectives of the program.
Recently, similar efforts were accomplished in Kent and Shoreline. In each of these instances, local governments recognized the favorable impact of such visits upon the life of the “vulnerable adult” population in these facilities (there are 130 adult family homes in Bellevue taking care of approximately 600 people) and sent a representative to initiate the efforts and gave their acknowledgements and well wishes to the group.
For some unexplained reason(s) not one Bellevue city official met the request to give a send off for the program by the KCLTCOP – in spite of pleas and requests since the end of April 2010.
Perhaps, sometime in the future, a councilperson could drop in to one of the adult family homes to say hello to a unique segment of the city’s population. They are still our community.
John Stilz, Long Term Care Ombudsman