House bill 4362 would create statewide "silver alert" for missing seniors; committee hears testimony

Representative Johnson introduced House Bill 43 62 to the House Families and Veterans Committee, saying the measure would require the Michigan State Police to develop and maintain a plan to issue missing-senior-or-vulnerable-adult alerts using the federal Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) system.

"House Bill 43 62 addresses this gap," Representative Johnson said, arguing the current Moselle Senior and Vulnerable Adult Medical Alert Act of 2012 did not include provisions to use modern mobile-phone alerts and lacked centralized operational authority.

Kristen Merkel, a licensed master social worker with the Area Agency on Aging of Western Michigan, testified in support and described the human and fiscal stakes. She said nearly 200,000 people in Michigan are living with Alzheimer's disease and that a person with dementia who is not found within 24 hours faces a substantially higher risk of serious injury or death. "We really needed it yesterday," Merkel told the committee, urging lawmakers to reduce search costs and trigger faster responses by using existing wireless alert infrastructure.

Merkel described personal emergency response systems (PERS) funded by the Kent County Senior Millage and the Older Americans Act and said many devices route alerts to private call centers instead of directly to law enforcement. She said the bill would establish data pathways and protocols so alerts can be shared in real time and escalated appropriately.

Deneen Smith, executive director of the Friendship Centers of Emmett County, urged passage based on personal experience coordinating a large search for a 70-year-old man with dementia, David Moffitt, who disappeared in Emmett County in 2023 and remains missing. Smith said hundreds of volunteers and first responders searched difficult terrain and that witnesses had seen Moffitt walking near his home but did not know he was missing. "Silver alerts are not just notifications, they're lifelines," she said, and she told the committee that 37 states plus Washington, D.C., have standardized silver-alert systems.

Witnesses described how the legislation would work in practice: an alert could be issued only after the required missing-person report is completed and a formal request is made to the state police; alerts would follow state-police policies to protect privacy and use bulk mobile notifications, highway message boards, broadcast media and social platforms to reach the public quickly. Proponents said leveraging the federal WEA system avoids duplicative technology and can lower the cost of resource-intensive searches, which witnesses estimated can range from tens of thousands to more than $100,000 for large multi-jurisdiction searches.

Committee members asked how the system compares with other states' programs (members were told dozens of states have silver-alert systems), whether parents or families can decline school notification under related programs, and how the program would be implemented in practice. No vote was taken; the bill was presented and testimony was received.

Ending: Supporters urged the committee to pass House Bill 43 62 to standardize and modernize Michigan's response to missing seniors and vulnerable adults and to reduce preventable deaths and high-cost search operations.