Preparing the Salt Lake County Outreach Program for the 21st Century: Using Modern Technologies to Meet Future Needs

Utah, as well as the nation, is experiencing dramatic growth in the number of elderly persons. Although many of today's seniors are healthier and more affluent than previous generations, many are also at risk because of limitations in income, health, and lack of connection to available resources. Seniors prefer to remain active and independent in the community rather than be institutionalized. To accomplish this, accurate and appropriate resource information needs to be easily accessible by older persons and their caregivers. In response to the directives of the Older Americans Act that resource information be available, Salt Lake County Aging Services Outreach Program serves as a clearinghouse of information for area seniors ages 60 and above and their caregivers. Outreach personnel rely on the program's manual (or resource directory) as their main source of information to connect seniors and services. They have insufficient employee resources, however, to keep the directory current and to make improvements that will add to the efficiency and effectiveness of completing daily tasks. Volunteers are a crucial part of the Outreach Program. This master's project describes a recent effort to evaluate, update, modify and improve the reference manual as well as to streamline the process and make recommendations for systematic future updates. In the process of completing the project, information has been transferred to a format that will help meet the county's goals of moving into the 21st Century and using advances in technology.