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Milton offers GPS watches to track people with dementia

Care Predict
Style of watch similar to what Milton will be using

A new program in Milton is using GPS wrist watches to locate people with dementia who wander off.

 

The program is called Operation Safe Return. It lets families of people with disabilities like dementia, Alzheimer’s or autism set up safe zones for their loved ones.

 

"If the individual in the program walks past that area, an alarm will go off and the family will be notified," said Milton Police Chief Robert Longo.

 

Families will get a text alert but only the police will have access to the GPS location of the missing person.

 

Longo said there’s a good reason the family doesn’t have access to the location data.

“Heaven forbid there’s a bad outcome. I don’t believe in my heart the family should be the one to see that,” he said.

 

Longo has been wanting to implement a program like this for a while. Last year there were 138 Gold Alerts in Delaware, and 20 percent of those missing persons calls were in Sussex County.

 

Police and firefighters are dispatched for each call so it can be a huge cost to respond to an alert. These new GPS watches provide the opportunity to cut some of those costs during false alarms.  

 

But Longo said a missing persons case in February is what made him rush to adopt the Safe Return program this summer.

 

“We had two girls who were dropped off at the library to do some school work. And when the family returned the children were gone,” he said. 

 

The girls were found safely hours later hiding in their home.

 

But Longo feared what could have happened to the girls in the freezing temperatures. He said GPS watches would have helped police find the girls immediately.

Milton is planning to start with six watches on July 1 and expand the program to meet the city's need.

 

Each watch cost $300 with a $15 a month service fee, which is all being paid for by a state grant.