Borough Council Donates $6,000 to Senior Center

Candace Braun

Borough Council unanimously voted to donate $6,000 of its funds from the Bonner Foundation to the Princeton Resource Center for 2004. The center is experiencing a budget cut of $8,000 this year from the Princeton Housing Authority.

The Borough funding will be a one-time donation so that the center will have time to find an alternative source of funding next year, Robert Bruschi, Borough administrator, said at the June 22 Council meeting.

The Bonner Foundation donates approximately $15,000 each year to the Borough for matters of public purpose that have not been accounted for in the Borough's budget. While Mr. Bruschi originally proposed a donation of $5,000 to the senior center, Council unanimously voted to increase that donation to $6,000.

The Princeton Housing Authority, which has experienced federal budget cuts over the last several years, reduced its funding to the senior center to $12,000 from $20,000. Its senior budget funding was also cut in 1999 to $20,000 from $29,000.

The Housing Authority's cut in funds to the senior center will most likely continue in the upcoming years, said Mr. Bruschi: "My concern is that sometime in the near future the funding is going to dry up altogether."

Areas of service that this funding supports include staffing, transportation, and case management and social services for the approximately 120 senior residents living in Reading and Spruce Circles.

Susan Hoskins, executive director of the senior center, said she will continue to seek funding for the $2,000 shortfall for this year, as well as the full $8,000 the center will need next year.

"I'm doing everything I can to make up the difference," she said.