Letter to the Editor from Deanna Lewis, Daviess County Multi-Purpose Senior Center in Gallatin

With the media exposure recently concerning a couple of senior centers in northwest Missouri, I thought this would be a good time to let everyone know what is going on at the Daviess County Multi-Purpose Senior Center in Gallatin. Like the other centers, we are going to have a very hard year. Our budget for this fiscal year is around $127,000. Of that amount, over $76,700 or 56%, is comprised of contributions people make toward the cost of their meal, memorials, donations, and fund-raisers the center hosts. The fund-raiser portion alone is around $31,600. The remaining 44% of our budgeted income ($56,300) is from federal and state resources.

Before our fiscal year started in July, Missouri Governor Matt Blunt considered withholding 25% of funding for home delivered meals. Fortunately for us, he decided to release these funds and the state legislature also appropriated some additional funding for home delivered meals in Missouri. Unfortunately for us, both of these amounts will be spread by a formula over all the meal programs in the state of Missouri. The trickle down effect on our center is approximately $6,600 in additional funding for the fiscal year. Once received, this additional funding will lower the estimated amount we need to raise in fund-raisers to $25,000. As anyone can imagine, $25,000 is a pretty lofty goal for a struggling not-for-profit in rural northwest Missouri.

July marked the sixth anniversary of my duties as administrator. I have seen our raw food costs skyrocket in the last three years. We served over 27,000 meals in 2005 with a food cost of $40,000. For 2003 the food cost would have been $31,800 for 27,000 meals. Our distributors can pass along the increasing costs of food and gas to us but we cannot pass them on to our clients and the level of funding from federal and state levels has not proportionately kept up with inflation.

We served around 120 meals five days per week. About half are home delivered and half are patrons who congregate at our center. We are confident the number of seniors in need of our services will only continue to rise as the Baby Boomers age. Our goals including keeping seniors healthy and active in their homes and not in long term care centers where most exhaust all the assets they have spent their lives accumulating and then must depend on Missouri taxpayer’s support for their care. I encourage everyone to support your local senior center as we will be hosting several fund-raisers. Who knows, someday you or your family may need our services.

Thank you

Deanna Lewis