Pa. lawmakers and banking industry push updates to Older Adult Protective Services Act to curb financial exploitation

Chair leaders of the House Aging and Older Adult Services Committee and the House Commerce Committee convened a joint hearing to examine proposed updates to the Older Adult Protective Services Act and to hear testimony from state officials, AARP and banking representatives on financial exploitation of older Pennsylvanians.

The hearing centered on proposals to modernize the 1987 law to add explicit protections and tools for identifying and pausing suspected financial exploitation, expand mandatory reporting and improve training and information-sharing among banks, area agencies on aging, and law enforcement.

Secretary Jason Kavolich, Department of Aging secretary, told the committees the current statute is nearly 40 years old and “does not explicitly address financial exploitation,” and urged a comprehensive update to protect “more than 3,400,000 older Pennsylvanians” from scams, fraud, neglect and abuse. Kavolich said 32% of the 53,837 reports the department received were allegations of financial exploitation and that reports to protective services have risen sharply in recent years.

Theresa Osborne, State Advocacy Director for AARP Pennsylvania, urged a multidisciplinary response that includes industry, law enforcement and policymakers. Citing federal data during her testimony, Osborne said publicly reported fraud losses in 2024 totaled $12.5 billion and that agency estimates of underreporting put the full loss figure much…