Family of missing Winnipeg senior begins new petition to change silver alerts

The wife of a Winnipeg senior who went missing at the end of 2023 is calling on Canadians to sign a petition to change how information about silver alerts is distributed to the public.

Brenda Moberg’s husband, 81-year-old Earl Moberg, was an avid walker who lived with dementia. On Dec. 12, just two weeks before Christmas, Earl wandered off and was never found.

“We think that there was one person who thought they saw Earl the next day at a Dynacare on Henderson Highway and she checked her phone and she couldn’t find anything about a senior being missing or being in trouble, so she just didn’t think anything of it,” Brenda said.

Brenda wants to change how silver alerts are sent to the public.

Currently, they go from law enforcement to media outlets, which can then share the information with the public. But Moberg also wants silver alerts sent to people’s mobile phones in the area the senior went missing.

“So it would be a targeted area,” she said. “Earl went missing here around the Bunn’s Creek Henderson Highway area, so only those folks would be targeted because I know people are worried that their phones will be going off all the time.

“Because Earl was missing late at night, it didn’t go out until the next day,” Brenda added. “And by then it’s been like 12 hours already by the time he went missing.”

Petition goal: 8,000 signatures

Earlier this year, Brenda gathered thousands of signatures in the hopes of making her desired change to silver alerts a reality.

“Government was prorogued, and then once that happened, all the 4,600 signatures were lost,” she said.

“I bumped into people who said, ‘oh yeah, I signed the petition.’ But they think that their name is added onto the new petition, but it’s not. So they have to re-sign again.”

Brenda’s already amassed 2,300 signatures since starting a new petition in early June, with about half of those coming from Manitobans. She is calling on Canadians to help her, this time aiming for at least 8,000 signatures country wide.

“Sixty per cent of those people with dementia are going to wander at one time and if they’re not found in the first 12 hours, 50 per cent of them will be found either dead from dehydration or drowning.

“That’s why it has to be fast. The senior has to be found fast.”

Brenda will be at Winnipeg’s Garden City Shopping Centre Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. to accept signatures for her petition, and again on Aug. 15 and Sept. 20. She will also be at the McIvor Mall July 19.

“This petition will not help Earl but it’s for the other seniors and vulnerable people that they will be found.

“There are other seniors that have gone missing in other provinces and they were walkers like Earl was, and people saw them walking and they didn’t think anything of it. Earl would go walking, they didn’t think anything of it.”

Kildonan—St. Paul MP Raquel Dancho will present the petition in Ottawa in October.