An Amber Alert-type response could save the lives of missing vulnerable people, an MPP says after an 18-year-old with autism went missing for more than two weeks near Havelock, Ont.
There’s a gap in the emergency alert system that needs to be addressed, said Monique Taylor, the MPP for Hamilton Mountain and the NDP’s critic for Children, Community, and Social Services. In December 2022 in her constituency, an 80-year-old woman with dementia who was not dressed for the weather was found dead after she had been reported missing.
Taylor is behind Bill 74, now in legislative limbo, which proposes that cellphone alerts be issued to notify people in the area that there’s a search for a vulnerable person, such as someone with autism or dementia. The new alert would be another tool in the toolbox for police to use to locate missing vulnerable people, Taylor said.
“There are so many situations where this could save lives.”
FULL ARTICLE: https://ottawacitizen.com/news/mpp-call-amber-alerts-missing-vulnerable-people
