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

Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Thursday, February 10th 2011

By Harold Egeln

Publication & Publisher: Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Left-right: Assemblywoman Nicole
Malliotakis, Aging Services Policy
Analyst Carin Tinney of United
Neighborhood Houses, Bobbie
Sackman of Council of Senior Centers
and Services of NYC, state Sen. Marty
Golden, and Executive Director JoAnn
Mason of the Bay Ridge Center for
Community Service’s Senior Center.
Eagle photo by Harold Egeln

Malliotakis, Golden Work To Halt State Cutbacks

BAY RIDGE — Standing up together in one of the oldest senior centers in southwest Brooklyn, two state lawmakers and two senior advocacy leaders said that they will fight to protect centers from threatened closings due to proposed state funding cutbacks.

Their target was Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s budget proposal to re-route $25.2 million in Title XX funds from the city’s senior centers into mandated child welfare programs, forcing up to 110 centers to close citywide. The action, if approved, could possibly close some of the 10 centers in districts represented by state Sen. Marty Golden and Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis, who led a press conference yesterday at the Bay Ridge Center for Community Service’s Senior Center.

“The governor’s proposed spending plan would redirect 25 percent of funding for our senior centers to pay for state-mandated services,” said Malliotakis, a Republican-Conservative who is a member of the Assembly Committee on Aging. She spoke at the press conference she called at the over 30-year-old center in Bethlehem Lutheran Church on Fourth and Ovington avenues.

With up to a third of the city’s senior centers facing shutdown, she said, “With such a high volume of elderly citizens in Bay Ridge and throughout Brooklyn, our communities would be particularly devastated by the closure. The people of Brooklyn rely on these establishments to lead healthy and prosperous lives.”

If the cuts are approved, closing over 100 senior centers, Golden, a Senate Aging Committee member and a Republican-Conservative, said, “The true meaning of those numbers translate into 7,000 seniors that will be abandoned and left without food, case management and the socialization that senior centers offer.

“We cannot let this happen and I will oppose any reductions in funding for these programs.”

“The Cuomo Administration’s proposal to cut $25 million from Title XX funds would result in the closure of 110 senior centers in New York City,” said Bobbie Sackman, public policy director of the Council of Senior Centers and Services of NYC. “If the governor is successful, over 7,000 seniors will show up at their senior centers on April 1, only to find them shuttered.”

In a successful fight last year to keep senior centers open, Bay Ridge Senior Center members were responsible for 300 of the 17,000 letters citywide protesting proposed cuts, noted Executive Director JoAnn Mason of the Senior Center. ‘We pledge 600 letters this time!” she said.