Letters to the Editor, Jan. 16
What I said to the committee
Below is what I said during the public forum of the Ashland ad hoc senior advisory committee meeting on Jan. 8:
On Aug. 6, Ashland was proud of its enviable senior center program staffed by dedicated highly skilled, knowledgeable and compassionate workers. Overnight, for no legitimate justifiable reason, that program was terminated. All staff laid off.
You, each of you, I am sure, are public-minded citizens who accepted the call to research and build a senior program. Have you asked yourselves Why? A superb senior program including social services and outreach was already in place. You are now spending a great deal of effort and time re- inventing the wheel. What are you laboriously trying to do had already been refined over decades to a model, efficient, always under budget, compassionate, widely admired program which did not need to be fixed. Instead it has been decimated.
Oh yes, finally an apparently skilled worker puts in one day a week at $58 an hour plus travel. The admired but laid-off director was in place five days a week at $32 an hour. What kind of an upgrade is that?
Do you feel good about being part of destroying such good? Currently in the dead of winter needy elderly seniors are not being properly served.