The Pennsylvania Department of Aging’s oversight of local agencies charged with preventing elder abuse is riddled with weaknesses and deficiencies that could leave vulnerable older adults at further risk of harm, according to a stinging audit released Wednesday by the state’s top fiscal watchdog.

The 80-page audit by Auditor General Tim DeFoor’s office also concluded that the department’s new system for monitoring the quality of abuse and neglect investigations no longer looks at key areas — such as whether an older adult was left at risk of harm — creating a rosier picture of how well caseworkers across the state are performing their critical work.

In all, auditors found 10 deficiencies in the way the aging department oversees and monitors the 52 county-based Area Agencies on Aging that provide essential services to older adults — and specifically, how well they conduct investigations into allegations of abuse, neglect, self-neglect, and financial exploitation involving people aged 60 or older.

In announcing the results, DeFoor noted multiple times that the department delayed the audit by roughly six months, largely because it slow-walked turning over data and providing access to key employees. He stopped short of assigning motives for what he called the “unusually long” delays.

But the aging department’s response, attached to the audit, reveals it took a combative stance, disputing most of the findings and accusing auditors of being unprofessional — rare behavior among government agencies that have been the subject of past audits.

In a statement released Wednesday, the department’s spokesperson doubled down, asserting that DeFoor’s office was playing “craven” politics, and calling the decision to release the audit six weeks before the November election “a desperate attempt to help his political allies.” DeFoor, a Republican, is not on the ballot this year; the office he runs is an independent state agency. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat whose office oversees the aging department, is running for reelection, with polls showing him with a double-digit lead over his GOP challenger.

DeFoor said Wednesday that such “personal attacks” do not change his office’s findings, and added that auditors made more than three dozen recommendations for fixing weaknesses in the system.

“At what point does the Department of Aging look in the mirror and say, ‘We may have a problem,’” DeFoor said, adding later: “If this doesn’t move the needle, I don’t know what else will.” The auditor general’s findings echo many of the failures Spotlight PA has documented over its two-year-long investigation into Pennsylvania’s older adult protective services system.

The investigation, called Unprotected found significant and persistent failures in the department’s oversight of county aging agencies, sometimes leading to devastating or catastrophic outcomes. The Department of Aging is led by Secretary Jason Kavulich, who was appointed by Gov. Josh Shapiro in 2023.

Among other things, the newsroom revealed that older adults are dying in increasing numbers while their abuse and neglect cases are being actively investigated; that counties wrongly dismissed abuse allegations they should have investigated; and that the department’s new monitoring system, known as the Comprehensive Aging Performance Evaluation (or CAPE), could make it easier for counties to be found compliant with state rules on conducting quality investigations.

DeFoor’s auditors delved into many of those same areas and found similar deficiencies.

The audit drilled down on two main issues: the ability of the CAPE to accurately assess the quality of abuse and neglect investigations; and the training that front-line caseworkers and others at the county level receive in order to carry out their critical work.

Among the findings:

— Under the new CAPE system, the department only monitors county aging agencies once every 18 months — contradicting state law that requires annual assessments. In fact, auditors found that, since the CAPE’s implementation at the start of 2025, only about half of the 52 county aging agencies had been monitored, leaving the department well behind schedule.

The CAPE, unlike the system it replaced, no longer uses a weighted scoring system when monitoring county aging agencies — a change that could inflate a county’s score for conducting quality abuse and neglect investigations.

— When monitoring the counties in the past, the department assigned heavier weights to more serious problems (such as when older adults were left at risk because of shoddy or incomplete investigations). The CAPE, in contrast, weighs all deficiencies the same, so less serious issues such as clerical problems are equally scored as more serious ones.

Auditors also found the department, under the CAPE, no longer even assesses whether older adults were left at risk when monitoring and scoring county performance.

— The department is erroneously asserting that state regulations don’t require that abuse and neglect investigations be completed within 20 days of receiving a complaint involving an older adult. State regulations, the auditors said, make clear that the 20-day timeline is a requirement, rather than a “goal,” as the department under Kavulich has maintained.

The department also now gives counties the ability to provide a reason for not meeting the 20-day requirement and scores those investigations as compliant, resulting in “potentially inflated compliance scores” for counties.

— The department does not follow an official review process when an older adult dies while their abuse and neglect investigation is still under active investigation.

Spotlight PA reported that the department, before Kavulich, had launched a fatality review process to track the cause of death for every older adult who died during an active abuse or neglect investigation. The department, under Kavulich, put in motion a new policy that halted that process, and instead left reviews — albeit non-mandatory ones — up to the county agencies.

DeFoor’s auditors recommended that the legislature update state law to require counties to review all suspicious deaths involving older adults.

— The department does not set a timeframe for investigating allegations of financial exploitation, even though it is a rising problem among the older adult community.

— The department has failed to ensure that caseworkers and other staff at the county level involved in investigating older adult abuse and neglect receive adequate training to do their jobs.

The Department of Aging disputed the majority of the office’s findings. Because the audit was launched soon after the switch to the CAPE monitoring system early last year, it does not capture “the full picture” of improvements to how counties are assessed, the department said.

It even went as far as to accuse auditors of not adhering to standards of objectivity and fact-based and unbiased conclusions that govern “professional audits.” “The audit report is inaccurate in its understanding, application and representation of the regulations, policies and laws the Department must follow in its mission to protect older adults,” the aging agency wrote in its response. DeFoor’s office called the reaction “unprofessional and unwarranted,” and an attempt to deflect from the audit’s critical findings.

Kavulich previously told Spotlight PA that while there is room for improvement in how counties keep older adults safe, there is no “crisis” in the system.

The news organization asked Shapiro’s office whether the governor endorsed Kavulich’s criticisms and accusations against DeFoor’s office. Shapiro spokesperson Rosie Lapowsky declined to answer the question, asking instead of DeFoor: “Are you assuming he was professional and adhered to accepted auditing practices?” She did not elaborate, and did not respond to follow-up questions.

Spotlight PA has reported that a state watchdog under Shapiro’s jurisdiction — the Office of State Inspector General — investigated the Department of Aging’s protective services oversight and produced a report in 2024, but that Shapiro’s office has refused to acknowledge its existence while also claiming that such reports are confidential. However, previous governors have released to the public findings from some of the inspector general’s probes.

In a statement Wednesday, state Sen. Wayne Langerholc Jr. (R., Cambria), who chairs the chamber’s committee dealing with aging issues, said the audit should have “a chilling effect on all Pennsylvanians,” and urged the department to take “immediate action … for the safety of older adults across the commonwealth.” This story was originally published by Spotlight PA and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.