CALIFORNIA - The four bills -- proposed by Democrats -- target licensing, fees, standards of conduct, monitoring, investigation and court review in a pivotal system designed to oversee financial affairs and living arrangements for people too fragile to handle their own affairs. The Los Angeles Times uncovered numerous examples of questionable dealings and financial abuse against elders who could not look after their own affairs.A woman from Elk Grove told a legislative committee that a temporary conservator, appointed with little notice to the family, succeeded in having the woman's 82-year-old mother forcibly and involuntarily removed from her Los Angeles home, placed into a locked psychiatric ward, and then transferred two weeks later to a nursing home. The 82 year old died before the family's lawsuit over her custody and care was over.
Statistics on the number of complaints filed annually against conservators are not readily available but the new laws are meant to increase safeguards and bolster confidence in a system of roughly 1,300 professional conservators.
The four bills are:
- SB 1550 which will create a bureau within the state Department of Consumer Affairs to test and license conservators, enforce continuing education requirements, and impose sanctions.
- AB 1363 mandates creation of uniform standards for conservators, requires courts to annually review conservatorships, orders additional case monitoring by investigators, and tightens requirements on fees, bonding, and the appointment of temporary conservators.
- SB 1116 increases court oversight over the sale of a conservatee's home.
- SB 1716 allows courts to consider informal reports of abuse or neglect, and requires that court investigators, when reviewing a conservatorship, consider the appropriateness of living quarters, the quality of care, and any physical or mental treatment provided.
Opposition to the conservatorship bills tended to focus on additional costs imposed and whether creation of a new bureaucracy to test and license conservators is warranted.
