Sequester Threatens Major Budget Cuts to Senior Center

For many, the sequester seems far away, the latest in a series of crises involving officials out in Washington, D.C., not neighbors here in Missouri. But for senior citizens across South County, effects of the package of automatic federal spending cuts will be felt deeply—not in their hearts but in their stomachs.

Unless Congress adopts a different budget, the sequester will force the Mid-East Area Agency on Aging to cut nine percent, or $250,000, from their $8.9 million budget for 2014. And since the agency dedicates 70 percent of that budget to providing free meals to low-income senior citizens, most of that cut will come down to a disturbing question:

“How do I decide which 300 seniors aren’t going to eat that day?” asks Patricia Hoeft, director of senior center nutrition for the agency.

Hoeft estimates that a $250,000 budget cut would mean eliminating 36,000 meals from the senior center’s meals program, which provides 3,000 meals a day in St. Louis, Jefferson, Franklin and St. Charles counties.

“We just kept hoping and praying that it wouldn’t really happen,” Hoeft said about the sequester. “These aren’t just meals. These are people. That’s what makes it so hard.”

Cutting Meals on Wheels

One cost-saving idea is to eliminate the meals-on-wheels program that delivers hot, nutritionally balanced food to homebound seniors and makes up 75 percent of the agency’s nutrition budget.

But Pamela Guest, administrator at the South County Senior Center on Lemay Ferry Road, says it’s the seniors who receive delivered meals that are the most at risk for going hungry without assistance.

“Grandma might be able to fix a bowl of cereal or a sandwich, but we guarantee a nutritionally balanced meal once a day,” Guest said.

See related story: Ruth and Mack Murphy Deliver for Homebound Seniors in the Mehlville-Oakville Area

For a senior who is physically unable to leave his or her home or can’t afford the grocery, gas or taxi bill to go shopping, delivered meals are a primary source of nutrition. Dieticians at the South County senior center formulate each delivered meal to meet one-third of a person’s daily nutritional needs, and already seniors who can’t afford or are unable to leave their home often stretch the food to last for several meals.

The value of South County’s home delivery program extends beyond just keeping seniors fed, says Guest. When one of her volunteer drivers noticed a regular client wasn’t answering her door, he called emergency responders, who discovered she’d had a heart attack inside alone.

“He saved her life,” said Guest, adding that the volunteers who deliver daily meals are “the eyes and ears for our homebound.”

Balancing the Budget

The sequester hits the South County Senior Center hard because of the cuts to the Older Americans Act, passed to help feed low income people. Faced with the sequester, Guest's other budget balancing ideas include closing the senior center and stopping deliveries once a week or providing five frozen meals once a week instead of daily warm meals—two inadequate and difficult options for Guest, who has worked at the agency for 13 years.

“That’s so hard to even consider,” said Guest, who has worked for the agency for 13 years. “This is my purpose. This is what I’m supposed to do.”

Budget strains are hardly news for the senior center, which has seen a steady increase in food, gas and insurance prices, which makes delivering meals more expensive and increases the number of seniors needing assistance.

“Costs keep increasing but our funds don’t,” Guest said. “We’ve been robbing Peter to pay Paul, but there’s no more Peter and there’s no more Paul.”

The agency still isn’t sure exactly how the sequester will affect the South County senior center, but until Congress passes a new budget, Guest and Hoeft say they’re preparing for the worst.

“To know they can just so cavalierly cut a food program that’s helping so many people, it’s very distressing, very distressing,” Hoeft said. “We’ve seen that Congress isn’t going to be a big help to us. We have to look at the community.

“We’re all going to have to work together.”

To learn how to donate time or money to the South County Senior Center, check out the center's posts on Mehlville-Oakville Patch.