Phoenix might close some senior centers

More than half of the city's 17 senior centers could close under a proposal now under review by Phoenix budget officials, who say the move could be needed to close a budget deficit of up to $250 million.

Gloria Hurtado, director of the Human Services Department, recommended closing some centers as a way of achieving budget cuts of 30 percent. If senior centers are closed, seniors would be offered free transportation to the next-closest center that remains open.

Hurtado would not say which centers will be recommended for closing, but said the decision will likely be based on how much the centers are used.

Seniors at the Shadow Mountain Senior Center in northeast Phoenix said they hoped the center, which just opened last year, would be one of the centers selected to remain open.

"We worked 13 years to get it in here," said Pearl Darnell, 90.

Gloria Barone, who was playing cards on a recent afternoon, worried that some seniors might not want to take the bus to a center that was farther away.

"The people who need it most are probably the most introverted, and they might not go to another center," said Barone, 65.

Hurtado said she is committed to keeping at least one senior center open in every district. Senior services cost the city about $14 million a year, of which roughly $10.5 million comes from Phoenix's general fund.

A 30 percent cut to the human services budget amounts to $8.5 million. Given those numbers, Phoenix simply can't afford to keep every center open.

"We cut everything else," City Manager Frank Fairbanks said. In recent years, Phoenix spared senior services, instead cutting youth jobs programs and homeless services. Now there's nothing else left.

Fairbanks said closing some centers would allow Phoenix to continue providing service to seniors.

"By doing this, they could serve every senior that's being served now," he said.

Some centers could reopen eventually if sales tax collections improve. But the bleak economic outlook, along with the fact that Phoenix has made cuts in seven of the last 10 budget years, has left city officials pessimistic.

"I just don't see the economy coming back during my career," Hurtado said. "I had that realization one day - I probably will not in my career see what we have been (able to provide) over many years."

Still, Hurtado emphasized that closing senior centers would not necessarily mean a loss of services.

"Seniors will not lose services. They'll just be at a different location," she said.

The budget proposal containing the list of proposed cuts will be unveiled Jan. 6, and will be followed by two weeks of community hearings. Three of those hearings are scheduled to take place at some of the very senior centers that could be closed under the budget proposal, Fairbanks said.

Cuts will be implemented in March.

Rex Farley, 85, plays double solitaire with Gloria Barone, 65. Both volunteer at the Shadow Mountain Senior Center.