Our Team

Iris C. Freeman, MSW, is a longtime advocacy leader in public policy for older adults. She is the Founding Board Chair of the Minnesota Elder Justice Center and remains active on its webinar faculty. As an educator, she taught Elder Justice and Policy classes to Mitchell Hamline College of Law students from 2008-2021. Earlier, she taught Community Practice, Advanced Community Organizing, and Advocacy courses at the University of Minnesota Graduate School of Social Work from 2003-2008.

In 2002, she was honored by the School of Social Work as its Alumna of the Year and in 2010 as a Distinguished Alumna of the University’s College of Education and Human Development. In 2011, she was selected by The Consumer Voice to receive the Elma Holder Founder’s Award for leadership in long-term care. In 2012, she was named a Leader in Public Policy by the Capitol Report/Politics in Minnesota journals. She received the 2015 National Adult Protective Services Association’s award for Advancing the Field through Collaboration in recognition of forty years work to build coalitions for elder justice. She and her husband, Warren Woessner, were honored for their leadership by the Minneapolis Legal Aid Society in 2019.

Ms. Freeman directed the Advocacy Center for Long-Term Care for over 20 years and was Director of Public Policy at the Alzheimer’s Association, Minnesota-Dakotas Chapter from 2000-2003. She has brought long-term care consumer perspectives to state and local working groups and lawmakers since the 1970’s as staff in these organizations and, later, as a public policy advisor to seniors’ and labor organizations. Throughout, she has served on numerous local and national boards and advisory committees. These currently include the National Adult Protective Services Association Board of Directors, where she serves as Secretary and Chair of the Public Policy Committee.