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01/24/2007: "Senior Center seeks new manager; ways to up meal count"

After guiding the Crofton Senior Citizens Center for the last nine years, Bev Merkel has decided to leave her position as manager.
Merkel made her decision known at the January 16 board of directors meeting and then it was repeated at the January 17 public hearing concerning use of the senior center. Merkel was unable to attend the hearing, because her mother was seriously ill.
Senior citizens president Virginia Lange and secretary Shirley Sawatzke were told of Merkel’s resignation at the board meeting. She has been the manager for nine and a half years and board members said many times during the public hearing that she “has done an excellent job.”

Merkel inherited a seriously troubled senior center and has turned it completely around in a short time after assuming the controls. The Center usually gets an A+ grade from the Northeast Nebraska Agency for the Aging.
Her resignation was accepted with deep regret by the board.
During the public hearing last week, Sawatzke read the list of daily concerns Merkel had written. Sawatzke and Lange added their own thoughts. They then took questions from the floor.
Though the day-to-day operation of the center has been done efficiently during Merkel’s tenure, the center is facing probation. Simply put: more people, especially seniors, need to come and eat, play cards, bingo and other activities of the center.
The main area where the center must improve is the number of people who avail themselves of all the things the center offers: easy contact with the aging agency, home health, housekeeping aid, legal aid, tax help, explanation of government programs, etc. If the information is not available through the Crofton center, officials with the center or the aging agency refer those who ask to the those who know and can help.
It seems that everything has been tried. Volunteers take meals once a month to Niobrara, Creighton and Bloomfield, and twice monthly to Verdigre. They deliver meals everyday (no weekends) to the homebound seniors in Crofton, those who are unable to drive or find it difficult to get to the center. Without those meals the center’s doors would have closed a long time ago.
In fact, Merkel said she compared the center’s meal servings from a year ago to now, and it has ropped from 1032 to 544. That is a large loss of meals on the center’s daily count, which is used by the aging agency to determine aid and meal price recomendations.
It isn’t difficult to understand why some people from Bloomfield, Creighton, Verdigre and Niobrara are willing to participate in senior activities. They get together with friends while enjoying good conversation and a good meal.
On the other hand, Crofton has a lot of empty spaces left by members who died or have moved away. The “young” seniors, it was pointed out at the hearing, who might fill those spaces, “are waiting to get old.” Without active participation, the center may be forced to close, and those 60 year olds who waited to get old won’t have a center to go to or to help them.
The aging agency officials said they know how many people in Crofton are 60 or older. Of that number, a certain percentage must use the center’s services or the center will be closed. Over sixty other towns are waiting for a chance to have a center. aging agency officials noted, and they would jump in and take Crofton’s spot on the agency’s list of centers it supports if Crofton’s center were to close its doors.
If Crofton’s meal count doesn‚t meet the aging agency’s projected number, Crofton will lose the center soon. Aging agency officials made it clear, that’s not a threat, it is reality.