CSCS: Council of Senior Centers and Services of NYC, Inc.

Allmediany

Monday, March 7 2011

By Rebecca Baird-Remba

Publication & Publisher: Allmediany

- by Rebecca Baird-Remba, Staff Writer;
Image: Senior center directors,
state lawmakers the Brooklyn
Borough Hall President and
seniors gathered at Brooklyn Borough
Hall on Friday to discuss proposed
state cuts to senior centers

State lawmakers, senior center directors, the Brooklyn Borough President, and seniors gathered Friday at Brooklyn Borough Hall to discuss the potential state budget cuts to senior centers, which could close 110 senior centers on April 1.

Governor Cuomo’s new budget proposal includes a $25 million cut to Title XX, a program that funds 25% of New York’s senior centers. With the closing of 110 centers, which is almost half of the senior centers in the five boroughs, nearly 10,000 seniors will not have a senior center nearby.

There are 256 senior centers currently operating in New York City.

“More than half of our seniors live under the poverty line,” said Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. “For many seniors, these centers provide a reason for living.”

If the cuts are passed, more than 2.5 million meals provided to seniors every year will disappear, including thousands of meals on wheels delivered to house-bound seniors.

Jose Ortiz Ortiz, executive director of the Spanish Speaking Elderly Council, which operates senior centers in Red Hook and Wyckoff Gardens in Brooklyn, said, “Both of our centers are in areas where the poverty level is above the city average. More than 90% of our seniors live on less than $14,000 a year.”

The city poverty level is $10,000 a year.

The Red Hook senior center is already an isolated community, said Ortiz. If their senior center closes, those seniors will have nowhere else to go.

“They’re going to continue to demonize me [because I oppose these cuts], and I don’t care – because my mother goes to a senior center that’s about to close!” declared state Senator Eric Adams, who represents the 20th district in Brooklyn. “We have to make sure three areas are safe from cuts: children and the education system, special needs individuals, and seniors.”

Governor Cuomo has proposed diverting the Title XX funds to child welfare agencies, creating a debate over who deserves the funding more – seniors or children. Senior center directors and lawmakers alike argued that neither group should face cuts, and that the millionaire tax should be extended, bringing an estimated $1 billion in extra revenue.

The state levies the millionaire tax, which is set to expire this year, on New Yorkers who earn more than $200,000 a year.

Cuomo has said he does not want to extend the millionaire tax because he thinks it is driving the wealthy from New York.

“The millionaires are not leaving the state,” said Assemblyman Karim Camara, who represents the 43rd district in Brooklyn. “You know who’s leaving? The seniors are leaving, because they can’t afford New York taxes.”

Lifelong Brooklyn residents Beatrice Levy of Canarsie, 87, and Jane Bass of Sheepshead Bay, 90, both attended the meeting at Borough Hall with a group of seniors from their center, the Jewish Association Services for the Aged (JASA) in Canarsie, Brooklyn. Although their center will not close, they still wanted to voice their opposition to the closing of so many others.

Levy protested in favor of the millionaire tax in Albany last weekend with JPAC, the Joint Public Affairs Committee for Older Adults, a social advocacy group for seniors.

“We were saying in Albany, ‘Tax the millionaires!’, but there were signs on the limousines going by that said ‘Don’t tax the millionaires!’” said Levy.

Last year, Gov. David Paterson’s budget threatened to close 75 percent of the city’s senior centers by diverting the Title XX funds toward state programs to combat domestic violence and elder abuse. But the City Council, which usually provides up to 40 percent of the centers’ budgets, helped keep 17 centers open.