Saugus Senior Center dealt heavy blow

SAUGUS – When Gov. Deval Patrick handed down his budget cuts Thursday he may as well have handed down an eviction notice for the Senior Center.The Senior Center took a $100,000 hit with the budget cuts, nearly half of its budget.Council on Aging President Richard Barry was stunned by the news.”I don’t know where we’ll go from here,” he said. “We just can’t handle that kind of cut.”Barry heard the news after Rep. Mark Falzone (D-Saugus) called him personally to deliver it.”The silver lining is the Senior Center is still getting $100,000,” he said. “Obviously it’s better than zero but it’s thoroughly devastating and I’m not going to try and make it pretty.”Barry said the center’s total budget is about $250,000, which funds the director’s position, a couple of van drivers and a few people who help out with the lunch program.It is the lunch program and the van rides that most worry Barry.The Senior Center puts out roughly 75,000 meals a year, 200 per week are through the meals-on-wheels program.Barry said that program has also served a dual purpose.”When we go to the door if they don’t answer we call the police to check on them,” he said. “We’ve found people on the floor. Whether that program can survive, I don’t know.”Likewise the van program picks up seniors and takes them to medical appointments at a dozen area hospitals. Barry said he is afraid some seniors won’t go to their appointments if they don’t have access to the center’s ride program.”Ironically we just got our fourth van through the state grant program and paid our share for it, $20,000,” Barry said.It was just one year ago that Barry thought the center had seen its hardest times.”It was almost worse,” he said. “We didn’t know if we could pay the utilities.”The Council on Aging got through the crisis by tapping into its gift accounts and utilizing funds held by the Friends of the Senior Center. That accounted for nearly $92,000, which Barry said about wiped out their accounts.”We don’t have that this time,” he said.Barry said for now he is taking the cut in stride because there is little else he can do.”I’ve learned to mellow,” he said. “From where I sit there isn’t really anything I can do . . . I don’t have the solution.”Town Manager Andrew Bisignani said if it came down to it he would try his best to find the money to keep the center open.Barry said he put a call into Bisignani late Thursday and was waiting to hear from him. The Council on Aging will also meet Monday.”So many people have troubles,” he said. “I don’t know what people will do if they don’t have the center.”