A state budget shortfall of roughly $10 million for the Department of Aging and independent Living, which operates under the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services, has resulted in many senior citizen centers across the Commonwealth having to make some tough cuts, including stopping home delivery meal services for hundreds - an outreach that allows many seniors to stay home independently.
While the cuts have impacted many seniors in Kentucky, it's not good news, especially in Eastern Kentucky, where there is more economic hardship in rural communities. Kentucky 29th District State Senator Scott Madon, who represents in the General Assembly the five counties in the eastern portion of the state, including Bell Floyd, Harlan Knott and Letcher, said his area was going to feel the senior meal cuts the most.
Madon, a Republican from Pineville, has been one of the more outspoken legislators fighting for the budget shortfall for the senior citizen meal program to be corrected. He is hoping that the executive branch, namely Governor Andy Beshear, will find funding so that more seniors will not be cut from the home meal delivery program.
According to Madon, the Department of Aging and independent Living provided increased number of meals for seniors during the Covid-19 pandemic. When it was time to allocate funds for the program with a new budget cycle, not enough money was requested to cover the growing list of senior meal delivery clients.
Madon told WUKY News that he was serving as the chairman of the Cumberland Area Development District, an area that has been impacted hard by the budget shortfall cuts along with the Penyrile Area Development District in Western Kentucky, when they saw the numbers last summer and realized there wasn't going to be enough money.
Area Development Districts funnel the money from the state to the senior citizen centers for meals. Madon said the lack of funds for senior home delivery meals was serious enough that many legislators think the governor should call a special session to fix the miscalculation in the budget.
While senior citizen centers are making tough decisions in the number of clients they are having to hopefully only temporarily cut, Madon and other legislators, along with many county leaders throughout the Commonwealth, are hoping the executive branch will find a solution so that more senior meal clients will not be cut in the next few months.