My dad lives alone and takes his own medicine.. He has mild ALZ. Since the guardian was appointed he is not allowed to say who he wants to have over or who he wants to go to breakfast with. Everything is controlled for him. In court, he named 2 daughters he wanted as a guardian if he had to have one. The judge ignored him and gave guardianship to another daughter whom he didn't want.
Guardians or conservators MAY take the person's wishes into consideration, but they do not not HAVE to. They also don't have to listen to or consider other family members' request or suggestions.
There was a legal cost involved in getting the conservatorship in the first place. However, if the non-conservator family members feel that the conservator is inadequately or inappropriately taking care of the patient, they can at their own expense return to court with their complaints. But those complaints had better be fully documented, completely accurate and confirmed, generally by an unbiased party such as social services.
Sorry to be a doom-sayer but conservatorships are an ugly and costly business. Funny enough, they generally go pretty quickly if the patient has no money. When money is involved, the court and the lawyers drain off most of it, until there is not much more left. It's such a good idea to have the DPOAs & HPOAs set up in advance of dementia, but if there is disagreement with in the family, even those can be challenged.
"Mild" Alzheimer's is really early stage Alzheimer's. The disease progresses. It will not stay mild.
Check your state's Patient's Bill of Rights. Even if a person is incapacitated, they still retain certain rights such as the right to have phone calls and visitors, unless it can be proven that the visitors would in some way be harmful to your father. You may want to contact your father's attorney.
Most of the time, the guardian will have to report to the court on a regular basis (how regular depends on your state law) a specific document showing how the person's funds or assets have been used. These should be public records obtainable through probate court (where most guardianship are heard) at your courthouse. Most courthouses have all filed documents down-loadable for a small fee. So you can look through these for things that may be questionable.
BUT for me, the bigger issue is why, if there were 3 kids, the court selected 1. What is it about this daughter that makes her more suitable??? or what is it about the other 2 that makes them unsuitable??? You kinda need to look hard at what might be in your or your sister's background that the judge viewed you all as unsuitable. You know the court can run a credit and background check on you & your family; they can run a crisscross on any property owned by you & your family. If there is something amiss….like any garnishments, judgements, bankruptcies, unpaid taxes, you have a kid with a juvee record, you are on any state welfare program or are unemployed (and the chosen one has substantial income or has a good job), you have had a felony record, etc; then you or anyone else in your household are looked at as not being suitable as a guardian.
Realize that the judge does NOT have to even select family to be guardian. They can and often do select a guardian who has undergone state training and does that for a living, like what GladImHere said. The judge has a list of them. Sometimes they are in the courtroom waiting to be selected when family starts in-fighting during the hearing. Judges really take no truck to having that in their courtroom and do a court appointed to put an end to that nonsense. My point is if there is something that could be an issue for your & your other sister's suitability, then having your sister appointed is probably better than an outsider. At least your & your sisters have a shared history with each other and your dad.
or they may SEEM making mild
the courtroom is THEIR stage