Something similar happened with a door not closing properly, where it was just a simple technique to it closing, unfortunately those small things are on us. 

its just part of the social contract we all agree to when deciding to live and invest in the US. 

Found her son on social media hoping he is actively managing the property but have received no responses after attempting to contact.

While doing all this, you can share your experiences on social media to attract people willing to invest their money with you.

Who has had success in working with local governments on this, and what sort of techniques and tactics worked? 

Curious to methods people use to find distressed properties or is it truly just searching through listings on zillow/Redfin etc Yes that can be effective for finding deals but if you really want to rank out up you need a motivated seller website SEO optimized and you can run ads on google adds and social media.

I currently run about 20 pages personally on Facebook ,but also own a marketing business that focuses on social media marketing and SEO.

You do a Google search or look on any of the social media platforms and see 100 people trying to sell you a get rich quick real estate investing strategy or whatever it may be. 

Is it necessary or is social media sufficient? 

The big influencers on social are still talking about forbearance and foclosures - if I do some napkin math and divide it by 50 States, that additional inventory (most will sell, not forclose) will not amount to enough to fill the market.How will we get out of the inventory shortage?