Abstract Since its founding in 2013, Senior Housing Preservation-Detroit has worked tirelessly to address the displacement of older adults, the loss of senior housing as the city gentrifies; and ways to improve quality of life to those living in senior housing. As we turn the corner on the acute phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, the members of Senior Housing Preservation-Detroit are compelled to take stock of the lessons learned from the urgent, emergency context of serving older adults in the city of Detroit, and particularly those living in senior buildings. Whether the next emergency is isolated to a single building (in case of power outages or flooding) or affects many buildings (due to another infectious disease, our changing climate, etc.), we know that preparation must continue to happen on an individual and building level. Building staff and residents alike must be ready to respond to multi-faceted problems, and there must be better plans for serving a diverse senior population. SHP-D has explored ways to reduce risks to seniors in the next emergency, including improving communication, implementing preparedness plans, and enhancing the physical resiliency of buildings. This presentation will focus on the coalition’s work on emergency planning to share knowledge which may benefit other communities planning for older adults in emergencies.

OBJECTIVE:This study examined education, partnership status, and the moderating role of the lockdown period on social connectedness during the COVID-19 pandemic in a sample of urban African-American older adults. METHODS:Five hundred thirty-four African-American adults living in Detroit (91.0% female, Mage = 74.53) reported demographic information pre-pandemic and answered one social connectedness questionnaire between April and December 2020. RESULTS:Participants interviewed after the lockdown (post-June 2020) reported more loneliness than those interviewed during the lockdown (April-June, 2020). Married/partnered participants reported less loneliness and social isolation. Loneliness did not differ between those with high education levels interviewed during the lockdown compared to post-lockdown. However, among individuals with low education levels, those interviewed after the lockdown reported more loneliness than those interviewed during the lockdown period. CONCLUSION:Our findings suggest partnership status is associated with more social connectedness during the pandemic and education accentuates the effects of forced isolation related to loneliness among urban African-American older adults.

Doctoral students studying anthropology are increasingly interested in developing skills in quantitative methods, policy analysis and development, community organizing, and team research. The scientific community, granting agencies, and foundations have a growing focus on research and scholarship focused on ameliorating social problems. However, students often find that they need additional skills beyond academic anthropology to address these issues. We propose interdisciplinary training in social work and anthropology as one solution. Social work offers training in quantitative methods, needs assessments for service development, program design, policy analysis, policy negotiation, and community organizing skills. The goals of a more activist anthropology harmonize well with social work's disciplinary focus on action and solutions to social problems that are acceptable to community partners. As students cultivate the ability to communicate and act in multiple disciplinary "languages", they have the potential to make profound contributions to ameliorating social problems through applied scholarship and research in both academic and non-academic settings. Integrated doctoral programs such as the Social Work and Anthropology (SWAN) degree are pivotal for training doctoral students for a wide range of roles addressing and contributing to solutions for social issues. Such training integrates social theory with a range of practical and research methods skills. Society needs the expertise these dually trained graduates provide; and faculty have an ethical responsibility to prepare students for positions beyond the academy. Programs considering implementing this type of program should have substantial institutional support to overcome possible structural constraints and barriers. PhDs need social policy, analysis, and advocacy skills to thrive in non-academic environments focused on social change. We describe Wayne State University's Social Work and Anthropology (SWAN) PhD program as an innovative collaboration for meeting these emerging needs.

Abstract The Healthier Black Elders Center (HBEC) is the community outreach core for the Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research. Established in 1997, this center offers health education to older adults in Detroit and expanded to Flint, Michigan in 2021 and maintains a research registry of over 1100 older Detroiters and over 200 older Flint residents. HBEC Detroit launched a consulting program in 2020 with the Community Advisory Board (CAB) members to offer personal and professional perspectives regarding research. Through this program, CAB members have 1) disseminated knowledge about community engaged research approaches 2) offered feedback on comprehensibility and ease of use to individual researchers on instrument content and research design as well as 3) offered insights beyond the academy (technology and philanthropic sectors). This program has created opportunities for older Black adults to provide direct feedback on product, funding initiatives and research design. This presentation will provide an overview of the initiatives, recruitment, and retention strategies of a long-established center. This presentation will showcase the Consulting program as a way to engage leaders in its center’s work as well as provide learning and growth for its Detroit members. This presentation will also highlight the process of tailoring, adapting, and launching the HBEC program for the Flint community.

Abstract This presentation focuses on a multi-sector coalition focused on senior housing. Since its founding in 2013, Senior Housing Preservation-Detroit has worked tirelessly to address the displacement of older adults, the loss of senior housing as the city gentrifies; and ways to improve quality of life to those living in senior housing. This presentation will focus on the decade long work achieved respect among Detroit elected officials and housing staff through direct advocacy. Members have also testified at Detroit City Council meetings and participated in numerous local, state, national, and international forums on affordable housing for older adults. To date, coalition members have published four peer-reviewed articles; three invited articles; one white paper; and two book chapters as well as a documentary. The work of the coalition also involves numerous agencies serving older adults in Detroit. The Special Commission to Advance Macro Social Work awarded the coalition the Jack Rothman award for Structural Change in 2023. The presentation will focus on milestones, lessons learned, and the coalition’s COVID-19 outreach in senior buildings. It will offer perspectives on its current initiative on preparing an emergency preparedness plan for Detroit’s older population.

This article profiles a program in Detroit, MI, funded by the National Institute on Aging, called the Michigan Center for African American Aging Research and its key offshoot the Healthier Black Elders Center (HBEC). Board members of its Community Advisory Board weigh in on key programming and offer perspectives and recommendations on health and social issues. The HBEC Consulting Program is a blend of formal volunteering and paid work through consulting fees. The article also outlines next steps for HBEC.

This study explores the association of "Sensory Environment" and "Playfulness" with Depression and Cognition (SEPDC) among older adults living in high-density public housing neighborhoods in Singapore. The research conducted cross-sectional surveys with 400 adults aged 55 and above living in 20 such neighborhoods. Path analyses suggest that sensory environment (multi-sensory richness of a place and its capacity to engage) and playfulness (personality trait that enables rendering situations as playful) are associated with reduced depressive symptoms, memory problems, and loneliness in older adults, mediated by the increased "neighborhood cohesion" and sense of "at-homeness." Hence, sensory environment and playfulness are critical for healthful aging in place and should be considered carefully for better design and planning of aging-friendly housing neighborhoods.

In Flint, Michigan (USA), an ongoing anthropogenic water crisis exposed residents to lead and other drinking water contaminants. The neoliberal policies that created this water crisis made Flint residents responsible for their own safe drinking water. In this article, we draw on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2016 and 2018 among older adults in Flint to argue that the water crisis has deepened forms of responsibilized citizenship by making residents responsible for ameliorating harms of the state. Older residents’ narratives of previous experiences of racialized structural violence shaped the emotional qualities of their present experiences with contaminated water. By exploring these responses and situating them within narratives of the past, we show that contemporary water governance can operate according to a necropolitical logic, in which citizens are responsibilized not towards an optimized future but rather in response to harms caused by the neoliberal state. Necropolitical logic reinforces the racial and economic inequalities that characterize majority-Black postindustrial American cities, thus limiting the potential for equitable resource distribution. By foregrounding older adults’ experientially grounded knowledge of the sociopolitical life of water, we underline the need for a holistic approach to justice that addresses the harms of both the present and the past and the relational nature of these harms. This approach could work towards remedying the racially disproportionate experiences of water insecurity in the United States.

Abstract Launched by older Black adults from the Healthier Black Elders Center (HBEC) of the Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research, Critical Crossroads was created to engage older Detroiters in community conversations, advocacy, and strategies around issues of social injustice. Critical Crossroads provides older adults a space to discuss what concerns them at both national and local community levels, share their personal impact stories and experiences, and learn how these issues connect to social determinants of health. One important feature of this program has been attention to concerns of housing and its impact on older adults. This presentation will highlight two Critical Crossroads housing related segments (e.g., CDC moratorium on eviction, applying for FEMA aid for flooding). This presentation will share the This presentation will share the development of this community-led initiative, program goals, and lessons learned.

Abstract Housing preferences of older adults (e.g., to remain in residence, or relocate), housing options available, and housing needs related to changing physical and cognitive abilities are common concerns of aging. The challenges are possibly more complex for those living with dementia, who may have difficulty articulating housing preferences, and whose housing needs may include supportive care. For those with dementia who lack close kin, these challenges are likely significantly compounded. This paper focuses on the intersection of housing concerns for 64 participants in the Adult Changes in Thought (ACT) study who were kinless (no living spouse or children) when they developed dementia. All the ACT participants were 65+ when recruited. Everyone in this sample had received a research diagnosis, and their mean age at dementia onset (estimated at the midpoint between the research study that triggered the diagnostic evaluation, and the last research study before that -- usually one year before diagnosis) was 87 (Standard Deviation [SD] 7 years), with a median age of 86 and a range of 71-103.We present an analysis of their housing trajectories, as captured in chart notes from their medical records. We highlight multiple themes illustrating how housing intersects with health and social well-being and conclude by commenting on the potential of medical records for understanding and documenting issues related to housing.

Abstract The meaningful engagement of older people in research may help to address their lag behind other groups in health outcomes and low participation in studies. This symposium addresses the critical gap in the aging literature and advances knowledge about community engagement by offering insight from experts on the complexities of partnership and engagement processes that vary by context as well as tools and tactics for overcoming obstacles. The first speaker will present findings and lessons gained from evaluating the needs of a self-organizing community advisory board of Black older adults to increase enrollment in a participant research pool. The second will focus on the challenges of centering a diverse range of partners in the design of a health and wellness program tailored to the needs of formerly incarcerated mid and late-life adults. The third speaker will provide recommendations for researchers interested in working with Indigenous communities and strategies for working collaboratively, and how to overcome relational challenges. The fourth speaker will present findings from a reflective evaluation process of a community-based participatory research partnership that evolved over seven years and discuss how the partnership evaluation tool can enhance partner practice. This symposium concludes with reflections about meaningful and authentic academic-community partnerships in line with supporting and building bridges between aspiring and existing community engaged scholars and older people who are experts on aging.

Background: Black/African Americans are receiving COVID-19 vaccines at much lower rates than whites. However, research is still evolving that explains why these vaccination rates are lower. The aim of this study was to examine the effects of the pandemic among older Black/African Americans, with an emphasis on trust and vaccine intention prior to vaccine development. Methods: Data were collected between July and September 2020 from 8 virtual focus groups in Detroit, MI and San Francisco Bay Area, CA with 33 older African Americans and 11 caregivers of older African Americans with cognitive impairment, supplemented by one virtual meeting with the project's Community Advisory Board. Inductive/deductive content analysis was used to identify themes. Results: Five major themes influenced the intention to be vaccinated: uncertainty, systemic abandonment, decrease in trust, resistance to vaccines, and opportunities for vaccination. The last theme, opportunities for vaccination, emerged as a result of interaction with our CAB while collecting project data after the vaccines were available which provided additional insights about potential opportunities that would promote the uptake of COVID-19 vaccination among older Black/African Americans. The results also include application of the themes to a multi-layer framework for understanding precarity and the development of an Integrated Logic Model for a Public Health Crisis. Conclusions: These findings suggest that trust and culturally relevant information need to be addressed immediately to accelerate vaccine uptake among older Black/African Americans. New initiatives are needed to foster trust and address systemic abandonment from all institutions. In addition, culturally relevant public health campaigns about vaccine uptake are needed. Thus, systemic issues need immediate attention to reduce health disparities associated with COVID-19.

Abstract Black older adults are underrepresented in health research. Community members representing diverse aging-focused organizations in Flint, Michigan desired more accessible health discoveries, and formed a Community Advisory Board (CAB) in partnership with three local universities. With a grant from the National Institute on Aging (NIH), the CAB sought to promote research engagement through free community health programming and launching a Participant Research Pool (PRP) to connect Black older adults with non-invasive IRB-approved health research at participating universities. Despite extensive recruitment efforts by this academic-community partnership, including monthly virtual health seminars, a new website, tailored print and video promotional materials, a minority aging newsletter, and a community research symposium, the PRP remains severely under-enrolled after a year. An evaluation of recruitment strategies revealed a need for more frequent in-person programming, leveraging the social and professional networks of CAB members, increased intentionality in community partnerships, and more intensive and traditional modes of advertising to reach and recruit the target population. Lessons indicate that Black older adults in the community trust this research endeavor but require tailored and consistent outreach to engage with the participant research pool.

Abstract COVID-19 amplified system burdens and health risks within the housing care continuum, in which older adults with chronic serious illness are disproportionately represented. We present retrospective chart review data about the health experiences of older adults with serious illness living in and moving through temporary avoidance hotels during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through narratives of fourteen residents, we illustrate trends across two nine-month phases. Trends illustrate how avoidance hotels created opportunities for continuity of care, connection to services, and health-affirming relationships with place. We also identified challenges in catering to diverse medical, behavioral, and psychosocial-spiritual needs of older and seriously ill residents, as well as negative consequences to the geographic dispersion caused by de-congregating homeless shelters. Avoidance hotels present important lessons in considering future housing and healthcare intervention and implementation for older people facing homelessness while seriously ill.

Abstract Black men across the lifespan are overburdened by poor health and underrepresented as participants in health research. The Flint Healthier Black Elders program seeks to engage more older Black men in research that could contribute to health discoveries by developing and testing strategies to recruit Black men into a community participant research pool (PRP). The PRP recruitment strategies account for the influence of gender role norms, mistrust derived from current and historical research and medical abuses, and other factors that affect older Black men’s willingness to participate in safe and ethical research. This initiative also focuses on building trust in research engagement by foregrounding the voices of local older men as community stakeholders and research gatekeepers, and tailoring multimedia recruitment materials to represent older Black men more fully and positively. Videos and print materials developed as recruitment tools specifically tailored to older Black men were pilot tested for messaging and impact, and the results of this community-driven process can serve as an innovative model for equitable and trustworthy research recruitment in Black communities. We would like to acknowledge the contributions of the Flint Healthier Black Elders Community Advisory Board: Yaushica Aubert, Rev. Dr. Sarah Bailey, E. Hill DeLoney, Luther Evans, Ella Greene-Moton, Cynthia Howell, Bishop Bernadel Jefferson, Beverly Lewis, Geraldine Redmond, Sharon Saddler, Arlene Sparks, Erica Thrash-Sall.

Very little research has focused on how age factors into gentrification processes and how place branding helps drive gentrification. Scholarship on gentrification has engaged with the ways that race and class intersect to marginalize long-time residents politically and economically in the context of gentrification, but rarely analyzes the important role that age plays in exclusion, or how it is represented materially in the branding of changing neighborhoods. To address this gap, this article aims to present a better understanding of how age plays into representation in new developments through the branding of downtown Detroit as a young, hip place to live, work and play. The article outlines how older adults are excluded from the reimagining of the 'new Detroit' using a content analysis of media articles, social media, promotional materials and downtown redevelopment strategies. This analysis showed limited representation of older adults in new developments, activities and public spaces downtown. Instead, images focused on younger people, young families and young professionals enjoying downtown amenities, often highlighting their perceived economic contributions. Biased representations of changing neighborhoods create barriers to developing an age-friendly city. These findings inform the article's recommendations directed at planners and developers on how older adults can be better accommodated and included in the development boom of downtown Detroit.

Place and health are intricately bound. COVID has amplified system burdens and health risks within the housing care continuum, in which older adults with chronic illnesses are disproportionately represented. The paper identifies the health experiences of older adults with severe conditions living in and moving through temporary avoidance hotels during the COVID-19 pandemic. An interpretive descriptive approach was taken with qualitative chart data and provider observation to represent the experiences of 14 older avoidance hotel residents living with serious illnesses. Through provider documentation, we illustrate trends pre-pandemic, in the first nine months of the pandemic, and the second nine months. Such trends include strengths and opportunities such as the health-affirming nature of avoidance hotels, their potential in generating continuity of care and permanent housing, and synergy between harm reduction approaches and palliative care. Challenges were also identified in catering to the diverse medical, behavioral, and psychosocial-spiritual needs of older and seriously ill residents and the consequences of geographic dispersion on health care, health behaviors, and informal care networks. Through these strengths and challenges, avoidance hotels present essential lessons in considering future housing and healthcare intervention and implementation that addresses the needs of older seriously ill people facing homelessness and housing precarity.