Senior center curtails hours

WASILLA — Faced with a huge budget deficit, the Wasilla Area Senior Center has cut its hours and programs, and volunteers are scheduling a phone-a-thon fundraiser.

The center is now open from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday through Friday, said Wasilla Senior Center executive director Sondra Kaplan. The popular congregate meals continue at 11:30 a.m., and the Meals on Wheels and food to the assisted living facility are uninterrupted, she said. The exercise room and card room are open only during the operating hours and many of the classes have been cut.

The center no longer offers adult day care, Kaplan said, but it is partnering with Palmer Senior Center to help them accept the seniors who need supervision while their caretakers are at work.

When Kaplan was hired in January, the center had a deficit of $388,000, she said.

“We’ve been able to cut that in half, but that still leaves us quite a large deficit,” Kaplan said.

Running the center cost $2.5 million annually when Kaplan got there and only $195,000 was covered by grants, she said.

“We had to determine what our actual focus should be,” Kaplan said. “We were trying to cover too many areas with too little funding.”

Kaplan and her new management team, with input from the members, decided the congregate meals were a necessity for the senior community. Thus, the center will be open during lunch time, and any activities that can that can fit in those hours will still happen.

“It breaks my heart to have to close the center for those hours, but if you nave no money you cannot do things,” Kaplan said.

Even with the shortened hours, Kaplan warned, a large portion of the previous deficit still remains.

“The state of Alaska Division of Senior and Disability Services has helped, but the food program alone still has a deficit of $50,000.”

The center has turned to the city of Wasilla for emergency funding, but in the meantime officials want to prove they can help themselves, Kaplan said.

To do this, the center is organizing a phone-a-thon on April 23.

Residents of senior housing units in the area are calling community members from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Follow-up calls will continue through the weekend, and the teams will report their earnings on April 27.

They are calling it, “Feed a Senior For a Day,” and a donation of $8.50 will help do just that, while $170 will feed a senior for a month, Kaplan said.

“We are hoping to raise $50,000 by April 27 to directly offset the $50,000 deficit in the food program,” she said. “Just make sure that if you pick up the phone and it’s a senior, don’t hang up.”