Seniors Alliance of Platte Canyon

Background Statement

For those who are unfamiliar with the Seniors Alliance of Platte Canyon or SAPC, we first came together in 2019, born out of frustration that services for seniors did not seem to be filtering down to the Platte Canyon area. Park County funding for aging programs is under the umbrella of the Pikes Peak Area Council of Governance, or PPACG. PPACG is based in Colorado Springs and includes three counties: El Paso, Teller, and Park. Soon after our inception, we received the yellow book published annually by PPACG and were stunned that in the entire book, there was only one senior resource for our area.

Armed with the book, our frustration, and a determination to make a change, we attended the PPACG resource fair the following month in Colorado Springs. We met many entities serving seniors “in the PPACG area”, services like transportation for medical appointments and home health care. When asked when they would bring their companies to the Bailey area, we were universally met with the same response, “Bailey? That is way too far for us to go! No, we don’t go to Bailey”.

The Platte Canyon area is in a unique geographic position in Park County in which our senior service area is based in Colorado Springs, but care and services are closest to the Denver metro area. To all the PPACG senior service providers that day, we were at the end of the world. To the Denver Area Council of Governments, or DRCOG, we were on the wrong side of the county line. Their services stop just past the light in Pine Junction.

The SAPC Board quickly became educated in how senior services and funding works in Colorado, and we educated senior service providers to the plight of rural or “orphaned” areas. In 2019, our first year:

• Our Vice President joined the PPACG board.

• We attended the state Senior Advocacy Day at the State Capitol and talked to EVERYONE we met about the lack of resources in rural communities

• We hosted our own Senior Expo here in Bailey attended by more than 15 resource providers.

• We lobbied the previous Park County Senior Coalition director to bring more services over Kenosha Pass from our county seat in Fairplay.

• We partnered with the Mountain Resource Center in Conifer to host a Transportation Symposium which was attended by CDOT, DRCOG, transportation providers, multiple senior providers, Jefferson County Commissioners, and more.

• We coordinated the Park County 2020 Census Committee, knowing that we needed every senior counted to convince resource providers to come to our area, where two thirds of the Park County population live.

• We were awarded a grant to purchase equipment and establish a nurse lending closet.

We made noise

In the meantime, we asked for and won support from Park County Commissioners to establish an office in the newly opened Bailey Community Center. Just 10 months after we became an organization, we opened our office in February of 2020. One month later the pandemic shut down the world.

During these two-plus challenging years, SAPC used creative strategies, trial and error, and partnerships to engage seniors who, during the pandemic, were not meeting face to face, but also had limited access to digital information due to internet, technology, skillset, or health challenges.

We recognized some folks were not getting to their primary care providers as often as they should because of the pandemic. We jumped at the chance to partner with Conifer Rotary and 9Health to co-host a 9Health Fair in Bailey in 2020 and 2021.

When Covid vaccines became available, we worked with the Park County Public Health Agency to have them refer to us people who were challenged by online registration. You may recall that due to vaccine supplies, the only way to get a vaccine was through pre-registration. That is an issue for one with spotty or no internet, as well as technology or vision challenges. We were able to help many seniors access the vaccines they wanted.

Rather than a face-to-face Senior Expo in the height of the pandemic, SAPC hosted a drive through information fair with root beer floats. Directors donned car hop hats (and our pandemic masks and gloves) and handed out bags containing all sorts of resource material, cans of root beer, and vanilla ice cream cups.

And we waited, like the rest of the world, for things to get “back to normal”.

Current Mission

The four pillars of our mission statement are:

• Advocacy - We continue to advocate for our seniors whenever possible.

o We have a seat at the table of stakeholders for the PPACG transportation and transit committees

o Stride Medical – we are partnering with Stride to bring a regularly scheduled mobile medical clinic to Bailey, which will serve all community members

o Health Services District – we continue to pursue all options that would allow the citizens of Platte Canyon to determine (and vote) on their interest in researching the possibility of establishing a health services district

• Education - We partner with Fire Adapted Bailey (FAB) and the Platte Canyon Fire Protection District to offer classes in fire evacuation, and home risk mitigation including insurance and creating home defense zones. These classes are open to all but they have a special significance for our senior population.

o Individuals ages 65 and older represented over 70 percent of the fatalities from Hurricane Katrina (www.prb.org).

o 77% of the fatalities in the California Camp Fire were over the age of 65 (https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow

o An overwhelming majority of Hurricane Ian's victims were 70 or older. (https://www.foxweather.com/weather-news/most-hurricane-ian-deaths-in-florida-were-drownings-data-shows)

SAPC encourages all to complete their Got5 emergency contacts card and have it handy.

• Social – We strive to offer a broad variety of social opportunities, including:

o Morning Perk Up coffee paired with bingo, games, and more

o Herb Garden class presented by Extension Master Gardeners

o July Ice Cream Social

o Paint Pour Art Class

o Cowboy Poet

o Care for the Caregiver

o Nutrition 101

o Park County Cookbook Brunch with Park County Senior Coalition and CSU Extension

o Spring Swing Dance

o Internet Safety

o Card-making. Carols and Cookies with Fitzsimmons Middle School Band

o Knitting Circle - exploring this possibility as a result of a number of requests

o Afternoon Tea at the Glen Isle Resort

o Online Shopping Safety and Tips

• Resources - SAPC partners with many to bring resources to our area, including:

o Public Health Agency for vaccines and other health related events

o Park County Senior Coalition to promote their services to our area seniors including food, help around the house, handyman, and transportation reimbursement

o Mountain Resource Center to support their food van every Wednesday at the Community Center & the Everyday Eats program

o Mt Evans Home Healthcare & Hospice to bring the semi-monthly Blood Pressure and Foot Clinic to the Bailey Community Center

o Colorado Community Health Alliance who provided a grant allowing us to establish our popular Nurse Lending Closet, stocked with durable medical equipment for those with a temporary need for items like walkers, canes, wheelchairs, etc., all at no charge

o Between 2022 and 2024 SAPC volunteers responded to:

 728 phone requests for information

 111 requests for durable medical equipment resulting in lending over 172 pieces of equipment

 Hundreds of additional walk-in requests

Client Stories

• “Julie” (not her real name) came to borrow a walker and shower chair for her spouse who was coming home the next day after two months in the hospital and a rehab facility. Julie shared that she had been visiting Denver every day for two months. Asked if she needed help around the house or food to get them back on their feet, she was offered the application for the Coalition. 45 minutes after stopping by for the walker and shower chair, Julie left with food for the next few days, resource material for home healthcare, and the knowledge SAPC and the Coalition were only a phone call away.

• “Beth” called for a rollator walker - the ones with the seat and hand brakes. As she completed the lending closet form she paused, put the pen down, placed her hands in her lap, and softly said, “I don’t know how to do this. My mom has terminal cancer, and I am not sure what to do.” She told her mom’s story, and her own fears for how to care for her. At the end of her visit, she left with the rollator, and information for hospice care and grief counseling, hospital bed rentals, and our contact information with the assurance she can always call if she thinks of something they need.

Often clients will tell us they tried to call multiple places to get information. It is a goal of ours to be the “one stop” for families and people who don’t know where to start when needing information. Our mission is to connect people to the resources they need.

• A senior called to say she needed her oxygen replaced but the delivery company refused to go to her home - it was too remote and the road was not reliable. We negotiated a drop off in town where two of our volunteers took the oxygen to the home in a 4-wheel drive vehicle.

• Another senior could not pick up her food boxes because she just had surgery. Her food boxes were delivered to her by our volunteers.

• One senior ran out of fuel to heat her home when we had a cold snap late into spring. She received assistance to make it through and a referral to Human Services to learn about their home heating programs.

• One gentleman’s refrigerator broke and he could not afford the full cost of a new one. Human Services called us to ask if we could help. Weaving together donations from a few sources, the gentleman paid for most of the cost and donations made up the difference.

These are just some stories to illustrate what we do. Sometimes it is a short story. Sometimes it is a complicated novel. All are stories of real people trying to live their best life.

If you appreciate what the Seniors Alliance is doing for seniors in our community, we ask for your help. Are you willing to give a donation? Would you like to volunteer? Should you consider serving on our Board of Directors to help steer the mission and vision of SAPC? Visit our website at https://www.sapc.org or call the office at 720.385.8300.