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Politics & Government

Senior Center Committee Seeking Funding

Seniors requested a special appropriation from the Board of Finance Tuesday night, and instead now find the money in its 2010-11 budget.

Now is the time to plan and get the prelimary work underway to build a new senior center, but to do so the group working on the proposal needs seed money to begin the process.

Tuesday night, the Board of Finance heard from a group of senior center advocates who asked for a special appropriation worth $15,000 to get the process started.

Finance board Chairman Robert Clements told the group that although he was “fully in favor in an upgrading of the senior center,” it may take a couple of years before a new one is constructed. For this reason, Clement said the money should not come from a special appropriation from the town's reserve fund, but instead be included as a line item in the 2011-11 municipal budget.

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This did not sit well with senior center steering committee representative Wayne Reynolds who told the board that the $15,000 is necessary to fund the first phase of the process. Reynolds broke down the money this way: $5,000 would be used for preliminary planning and consulting and the remaining $10,000 would be used for legal, mapping and testing of three potential unidentified building sites in town. 

Reynolds said that seniors would come back to the town with phase two plans after they have a conceptual design and a more solid budget. They also intend to fundraise to help offset any costs, but before they can do this they need a definite site plan to “sell” to potential donors before golf tournaments and other fundraisers are planned, Reynolds said. 

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He told finance board members about the research he and the senior center committee have completed, including having met with eight representatives from other senior centers and toured the respective facilities. Reynolds passed around a picture of the Enfield Senior Center as an example of a property that the group visited. He said that the other towns' centers were “provided at little to no cost to their communities.”

Reynolds added that currently the Ellington facility is not comprable to those in surrounding towns. At 3,300 square feet, and rented for $300 a month, the Ellington senior center doesn’t feel like it belongs to the seniors in town, Reynolds said.

The proposed new building would have rooms where seniors could participate in different types of activities, as well as learn new technologies. Reynolds mentioned that other towns have billiards rooms, computer rooms, health service centers and dining rooms, among other things. He said Ellington’s 3,000-plus seniors should have access to those services in their own senior center. 

Although Clements supports the seniors’ effort towards planning a new facility, he questioned how to apply the funding given the time of year and with discussion on the next fiscal year's budget well underway.

Instead, of appropriating the money from the town's reserve funds, Clements suggested the $15,000 be added to the proposed senior center budget as a line item for the 2010-11 fiscal year that begins in July. Clements said the request should be approved in the regular budget in competition with everything else, otherwise it wouldn’t be fair.

Reynolds said by including the money as a line item in the budget it was as if town officials were saying that “it’s okay to provide them (seniors) with the most inferior senior center in the area."

Seniors in town feel like they are being shorted, and they want this center for their well-being and health, not just for entertainment. The seniors who attended the meeting and support the proposal said that moving request into a line item in the budget “sent the wrong message.”

One of the citizens attending Tuesday’s meeting said from her seat, “seniors lose again.”

Clements told the seniors at the meeting that they needed to have a more definite plan, especially in terms of phase two. 

“An engineer can give you a design for a hut or for a palace…” Clements said. He told the senior center committee members that they need to know what they plan to do, and roughly how much it will cost.

Reynolds said, at this point, they have no fixed time frame, and that it was still a little premature to have definite plans for anything further.

The senior center committee wants to move forward as soon as possible with their request. Reynolds said, “we want to go back to the selectmen this May.”

However, the town needs to stick to policy. The town seems to be backing the senior center, but the process of going about getting funding for a new senior center is unavoidable. Clements told the concerned seniors to call their state representatives to learn more about senior funding. 

“Chris Davis is putting together information on state funding for seniors,” Clements said.

The Board of Finance made a motion to put the seniors’ request in the regular budget. It was voted on and approved, along with a similar request by selectmen for a special appropriation regarding the HVAC control system in Town Hall. 

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