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Not even the city's seniors will be spared the budget crunch.
Although Department for the Aging (DFTA) Commissioner Edwin Mendez-Santiago has denied that the city is planning to close senior centers, according to media reports the city is moving ahead with its top-to-bottom restructuring of its 329 senior centers.
Officials estimate the city's population of individuals at least 65 will grow 44 percent by 2030 to 1.8 million.
Commissioner Mendez-Santiago has been quoted in media reports as stating that he expects the senior centers of the future to be "centers of wellness and vitality." The commissioner also wants to offer seniors the choice between hot meals and frozen meals, or vegetarian and diabetic meals, if needed.
Mendez-Santiago has also stated that fewer senior centers, each having a larger operating budget, could offer more services. DFTA has an annual budget of $94 million to operate the senior centers in the city. The food delivery contracts cost the city $27 million a year.
DFTA has used the number of meals served to measure senior center utilization, and defines senior centers operating at less than 90 percent capacity as being underutilized. Using that formula, the agency contends that 44 percent of the current centers are underutilized.
In a press release City Comptroller William Thompson expressed concern that DFTA may be preparing to close senior centers, noting that the agency in its Concept Paper mentions that it is considering setting up "regions" to "ensure the greatest number of older, low-income New Yorkers are reached in the fairest possible manner."
Thompson also criticized DFTA's meal count to determine if a center is underutilized, calling the method "anachronistic and misleading." The comptroller said that DFTA must find better ways to measure center success.
Thompson said he was concerned that the expansion and consolidation of the Meals-on-Wheels program, including the possibility of kitchen closures at senior centers, will result in fewer dietetic options. He also questioned the advisability of closing any senior centers.
"We must be sensitive to the reality that most seniors are strongly attached to their current center and programs," he said in a statement. "Relocating a senior to a center in a new location and with different programs could discourage him or her from attending any center."
State Senator Malcolm Smith called on DFTA to delay the implementation of a new modernization proposal for citywide senior citizen centers. Smith urged city officials to find a new course of action to avoid cuts to senior services, including food-delivery.
"The city's proposed 'Modernizing Aging Services' concept could place our seniors at risk by trimming down essential services while locking the city into long-term agreements without adequate public input," said Smith in a press release. "We can't jeopardize the health, nutrition and quality of life of our seniors in an effort to save money."
Councilman Joseph Addabbo of Queens said the administration's proposed cuts to senior centers "are absolutely not to be accepted." Addabbo also said that no senior should have a frozen meal.
"The more important issue to me is the visit, the visit with the warm meal that may be the only visit that they get all day," the councilman said.
Addabbo has noted that the meals-on-wheels daily hot meal delivery keeps seniors connected to the world outside of their home and acts as a safety net or early warning system when a senior has fallen, becomes ill, or needs additional help.
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