Lehigh County warns senior centers: Home-delivered meals at risk without state funding

Activities, nutritious home-delivered meals and protection against social isolation — those are just some of the benefits that senior services provide in Lehigh County.

Facing a potential funding shortage, however, Lehigh County says it may need to cut back on those services.

For the 2024-25 state budget, the state Department of Aging requested to increase the Pennsylvania Lottery Fund’s PENNCARE program from about $288 million to $303 million, according to the Pennsylvania Association of Area Agencies on Aging .

PENNCARE helps fund services such as senior centers, transportation, home-delivered meals and personal care.

However, the state passed its budget last month without the increase. JR Reed, the executive director for the Lehigh County Office of Aging and Adult Services, said this creates a funding deficit of more than $400,000 for Lehigh County.

Due to that funding shortage, especially as inflation drives up costs, Reed said the county will potentially have to cut funding to or close some of the 12 senior centers in the county.

He may also have to cut funding to the county’s home-delivered meals program, which Meals on Wheels of the Greater Lehigh Valley operates.

To prevent this, legislators would need to pass a supplemental budget bill for the PENNCARE increase after they return to session next month.

“Right now, we’re … looking for one of our [legislators] to pick up and champion this,” Reed said.

Seniors make up 25% of the state’s population, he said, adding that the number will increase to 33% in eight years.

Sue Wandalowski, Northampton County’s director of human services, said part of what exacerbates the issue is that funding from the American Rescue Plan ends this fall.

Regarding the potential funding deficit from the state, she said the county won’t cut funding to their senior services, and will instead look for additional funding elsewhere to offset the loss.

“I think that for Northampton County, we are in as good a position as possible, moving through this challenging time with state funding,” Wandalowski said.

Northampton County has 11 senior centers, spokesperson Brittney Waylen said. In addition to the senior centers and home-delivered meals, the county offers protective services against reports of elder abuse.

Rebecca May-Cole, executive director of the Pennsylvania Association of Area Agencies on Aging, said that not including the aging department’s budget request was an oversight by the state.

She emphasized the importance of supporting aging agencies and the services they provide, particularly because they help seniors stay in their own homes and avoid spending money on more expensive costs like hospitalization or nursing homes.

“It just doesn’t make fiscal sense not to support the work that the [area agencies on aging] are doing,” May-Cole said.

State Rep. Josh Siegel, D-Lehigh, said the PENNCARE increase’s omission from the state budget was unintentional, and that he’d support the state considering supplemental budget bill to include the increase.

“This was by no means malicious or the product of horse trading,” Siegel said. “Nobody was trying, in any way at all, to undermine or hurt our seniors.”

Siegel also pointed out the investments that the new state budget did make for seniors, including just under $3 million for the 10-year “Aging Our Way, PA” service improvement plan.

State Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, R-Lehigh, said he was disappointed to not see the PENNCARE increase in the new budget, which is part of why he voted against it. Mackenzie is a candidate for Congress, challenging Democratic U.S. Rep. Susan Wild in November’s election.

He added that he’ll potentially work on addressing the problem next month if the House-majority Democrats set the calendar accordingly, and he blamed the party for the oversight.

“It should be fixed,” he said.

Dina Kovats-Bernat is the director of development and communications at Meals on Wheels of the Greater Lehigh Valley, which she said annually serves about 2,000 to 2,200 residents in Lehigh, Northampton and southern Carbon counties. Those clients include both seniors and disabled people.

Kovats-Bernat said the organization could still serve residents if its contract with Lehigh County falls through, as it also receives funding from grants and private donations. However, she added that losing funding is a slippery slope, and given how unexpected events like the COVID-19 pandemic can change circumstances, she said she’d prefer to keep any funding Meals on Wheels has.

“It’s really scary to think that our most vulnerable citizens in our community — who are not able to help themselves, who have multiple medical conditions in addition to being homebound — might not be provided a common essential to life and a nutritious meal every day,” she said.

Rick Daugherty, executive director of the senior center Lehigh Valley Active Life in Allentown, said some of the benefits the center provides include group exercises, the opportunity to play in an orchestra, social interaction and classes that are free if one can’t afford them.

“We want this place to look good, we want the programming to be diverse and to be exciting, and we don’t want money to ever come into the equation as to whether or not somebody participates,” he said. “That’ll be harder to accomplish if our funding is cut.”