Social Work Commons^™

Comprehensive What? Coordination Of Whom? Area Agencies On Aging And The Planning Mandate (Revised), Roger A. Lohmann

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

The rural agency on aging did not – could not – engage in effective social planning because it was charged with a full range of responsibilities for sub-state decisionmaking among competing grant applicants. Several aspects of the Area Agency on Aging (AAA) planning mission are identified and discussed including “plan preparation”, rational decision-making, sub-state allocations and needs meeting. Widespread acceptance of the legitimacy of AAA planning goals generated three alternative models, which are termed the case management, inter-organizational and community structural approaches. More effective approaches to rural social planning might have combined elements of these three approaches in a regional …