Bond County Senior Center

Bond County Senior Citizen's Center
Life Saver
Capital Campaign for the Endowment Fund

[The information in this article has not been evaluated for accuracy since 2009 when it was published.]

Funding cuts jeopardize services.

The Bond County Senior Citizen's Center is establishing a foundation, similar to the Academic Foundation that was formed to assist the schools. This will help secure the future of services to seniors and their families here in Bond County. We would greatly appreciate your support of the foundation. Your donations are tax deductible and will stay right here in Bond County, helping your friends and their families today and for years to come. Please contact the Center at 664-1465 for information on the foundation.

Fred Baumberger, Greenville Kiwanis club member, encourages you to make a pledge of $1000 to offset the cutbacks beyond the control of local Senior Center officials. If $1000 is not possible, any amount will be of help in building an endowment fund to continue our local services.

Services that we provide include

Congregate meals -12,282 served last year
Home delivered meals - 9575 last year
Transportation - 14,116 trips last year
Information and assistance
Education
Recreation
Health Screening
Telephone Assurance
Medication Management
Caregive Resources
VITA - Volunteer Income Tax Assistance
SHIP - Senior Health Insurance Program
Illinois Power (Amerin IP) Warm Neighbors Energy Assistance Program
Ministerial Alliance Food Pantry

Co-located services:

Social Security Administration
Veterans Administration
Land of Lincoln Legal Assistance
Madison County Employment and Training

Our transit system is a general public system. It is not just for seniors!

Our current annual budget is approximately $300,000

About 10% comes from local tax revenue
About 45% comes from Older American Act funds
About 20% comes from the Illinois Dept. of Transportation
Balance is from donations, project income, in-kind services, and fund raising

We emply 4 full-time employees, 8 part-time employees, 2 part-time older workers (Title V, Experience Works), and about 100 volunteers!

Victim of Regional Reorganization

Funding Problems for Senior Center

(from The Greenville Advocate)

Over the past two years, the Bond County Senior Center has been receiving reductions in funding. Some reductions are the result of state funding issues; however, the bigger issue at the moment is the regional level decisions which change the way the programs are structured.

In the past, money used to be distributed directly at the county level. Now, the state has been broken down into regions of seven counties each, and the money is given to one person in each region to distribute to each county.

Recently the regional office [...] found that the low density counties (Bond, Clinton, Monroe, and Washington) were spending twice the number of dollars per capita that were being spent in the high density counties (St. Clair and Madison). They decided that in order to be fair, they wanted to equalize how much was being spent in each county.

"It sounds unfair on paper when you see that we're spending twice as much as the higher density counties per person," said Anna Oestreich, director of the Bond County Senior Center, "but when you realize that St. Clair and Madison counties have so many more opportunites available to people, it doesn't seem fair to take the money from our lower populated counties. We provide services in the community that are not readily available through other organizations."

For instance, in terms of transportation alone, St. Clair county has numerous taxi companies, public buses, and other transportation systems -- the only public transit available in Bond county is the Bond County Transit (BCT), which is provided through the assistance of the senior center.

[. . .] "If we look at the long range effects of these policies, Bond county will lose half of its funding for our older residents programs," stated Oestreich. "The bottom line (budget) would be about $67,000 for all services--meals at the center, food delivery, hospice, transportation, etc. The regional office may feel that St. Clair and Madison counties are underserved, but low density counties should not have to suffer."

[. . .] Though no target date has been set yet to begin the "equalizing project," the Bond County Senior Center has decided to undertake a capital campaign to help protect services for the elderly in Bond county. In addition to the capital campaign, they will also be hosting a golf tournament in August [or September]. "I hope that Bond county will help us to maintain and support our programs for the elderly and will contribute to our capital campaign," stated Oestreich.

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1001 East Harris Avenue, Greenville, IL 62246 (618) 664-1465

Bond County Senior Citizen's Center Life Saver Capital Campaign for the Endowment Fund