Cuts endanger help for older Americans

This July marks the 60th anniversary of the Older Americans Act (OAA). The OAA is the primary way the federal government delivers social and nutritional services to older adults and people with disabilities. This work is housed within the Department of Health and Human Services.

With OAA funding, last year Illinois agencies assisted 478,113 older adults, their caregivers and people with disabilities. The services provided include home-delivered and congregate meals; addressing social isolation; caregiver support such as counseling and respite care; transportation to medical appointments; fall prevention education; intervention to address abuse of older adults and people with disabilities; home preservation; access to benefits such as Medicare; and advocacy for older adults and people with disabilities.

The celebration of 60 years of progress under the OAA may be cut short, however. On April 1, the Department of Health and Human Services eliminated half of the small staff of the Administration for Community Living, the agency responsible for implementing the OAA.

It is our privilege to serve on the Advisory Council for AgeOptions, the suburban Cook County agency that distributes OAA funding to more than 70 community-based providers in the Chicago suburbs. AgeOptions is one of 618 area agencies on aging across the country that extend the work of the OAA into local communities — work made possible by the managing and coordinating work of the ACL.

Diane Slezak, president and CEO of AgeOptions, said in response to the cuts to the ACL, “For 49 years, I have worked to help ensure that this system remains strong. The erosion of ACL will destabilize a network that has taken decades to develop.”

For the sake of the growing population of older adults and people with disabilities in suburban Cook County, we cannot afford to return to the days before 1965.

George Motto, Arlington Heights

Leslie F. Weber, Jr., Mt. Prospect