Jeers for Meals-on-Wheels Pilot at Bronx Hearing By HEATHER HADDON
“We seniors built this borough,” said Joe Cohen, a Mosholu Parkway resident, who made the trek down to the Bronx County Building to attend with his wife, Kate. “Now government is going to thank us by taking money away from us.” Local Council Member Maria Baez called the public meeting in response to the widespread outrage over a Bronx-specific pilot program to begin next July. Under the proposal, Bronx meal providers would shrink from 17 to three, and the home-bound would get a weekly bulk delivery of frozen meals instead of their usual hot meals. DFTA defended its decision. “We are asking to end the anxiety-producing rhetoric that has caused seniors to fear for their meals and senior centers,” said DFTA Commissioner Edwin Mendez-Santiago at the hearing. “The Bronx pilot is much more than a response to budgetary issues.” What it is, according to Mendez-Santiago, is an attempt to increase provider efficiency. Instead of the current system — where community-based agencies and senior centers deliver hot meals daily — the Bronx would be divided among three contractors. Each would be responsible for 100,000 meals annually (some of the city’s 125 providers now serve as little as 1,200 meals). To meet that target number, providers would subcontract among community-based agencies. “We reviewed how other cities deliver their meals before we planned the pilot,” said Mendez-Santiago in explaining the agency’s reasoning. Those contentious plans also include the use of frozen meals. According to Mendez-Santiago, a case manager would assess recipients first for physical and mental handicaps that would make them unable to prepare frozen meals. Seniors who are especially isolated would also maintain their safety net of a daily hot meal delivery. But Mendez-Santiago stated repeatedly that those examples are more rare than advocates suggest. According to DFTA research, about 60 percent of Bronx seniors live with others. Based on that statistic, DFTA seeks to deliver frozen meals to 60 percent of the 2,000 Bronx homebound now participating in the program. “Seniors prefer pre-packaged meals in many cases because it gives them greater flexibility and choice,” he said. “Many enjoy the greater independence of being able to heat the meals when they want it.” Kate Cohen, 83, knows many seniors with a different opinion. “One 90-year-old woman is forced to constantly look over her husband who has Alzheimer’s,” she said. “If this plan was put in place, she would be even more afraid that he’d turn on the gas.” Cohen currently attends a meals program at the Mosholu Montefiore Community Center (MMCC). But since announcement of the pilot, she now worries about the day when meal delivery will be necessary. “What if there’s a blackout?” she asked. “What if you’re hungry? Can you eat your meal for the next day? This is putting further constraints on the elderly.” Current providers are also full of questions. “Who is going to provide the refrigerated trucks?” asked Fran Namzoff, MMCC’s Meals on Wheels coordinator. “What about the kosher food?” While Mendez-Santiago championed frozen meals’ ability to accommodate dietary or ethnic specifications, Namzoff was doubtful. “Kosher food is traditionally twice as expensive,” she said. Frozen kosher meals for Thanksgiving had to be ordered by MMCC from Pennsylvania — the nearest provider of such a specialty. Advocates also worry about potential layoffs from the pilot. “We know most of them have families,” said Cohen about MMCC’s deliverers. According to Namzoff, many of those employees work overtime without extra pay. “They are devoted to us,” she said. Mendez-Santiago acknowledged that about 60 workers would be transferred or laid off from the streamlining. Over 90 percent of this workforce is from the Bronx, according to a survey by Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion’s office. “This proposal seems to lack good oversight,” Carrion said. Bronx officials were surprised by DFTA’s proposal — especially since they were not consulted on it. Council Members Joel Rivera and Baez both sounded skeptical during the meeting, and Oliver Koppell expressed his disapproval in a previous statement.
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The Department
for the Aging (DFTA) was on the hot seat last week as about 200 seniors and
advocates let the city agency know what they thought of plans to radically
reshape the way the Meals on Wheels program operates in the Bronx. While
cheering that senior centers weren’t closed as a result of the recent
budget crisis, most audience members had little tolerance for the proposed
changes to the 30-year-old service.