Thanks to budget cuts from our state’s legislature and governor, 28 adult care centers across the state, including our own located at Boykin Center in Auburn, will be shut down by the end of February 2013.
18 senior adults here in Lee County will go from having a loving, familial environment filled with attention and care from trained professionals to being left alone to fend for themselves all day, with only the television to keep them company.
It only takes around $160,000 a year to fully fund the adult care center here – and only $2 million to keep all the centers running statewide, but our current budget apparently doesn’t prioritize the needs of more than 400 lower-income seniors.
Nevermind that, at $26 a day, the programs are far cheaper than the nursing home alternatives that most of these seniors will be placed into.
Thanks to advances in medicine and technology, we’re all living longer, and we ourselves could end up in programs like this one – but only if they still exist.
I encourage all of you to visit the Boykin Center to talk to the patrons and to see the happiness it brings to their lives.
For many of the people there, that center is a staple in their life, and the other patrons are de facto family members.
Go play some dominoes, help Mr. Pogue with one of his word puzzles and see what a remarkable difference a little care and attention can bring to someone’s life – and then let Montgomery know we need this vital service.