Tag Archives for National Council on Aging

43 Days to Reauthorize the Older Americans Act

Published in RINewsToday on August 18, 2025

The clock is ticking. Funding for the Older Americans Act (OAA) is currently secured only through September 30, 2025—that’s just 43 days away. Unless Congress acts to reauthorize the law or approve new appropriations before the start of FY 2026 on October 1, funding could lapse. A bipartisan effort must be made on Capitol Hill to ensure both reauthorization and the FY 2026 budget are addressed, avoiding any interruption in services for America’s older adults.

Last reauthorized in 2020, the OAA expired during the 118th Congress. S. 4776, spearheaded by Sen. Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-LA), chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), the committee’s ranking member, passed the Senate by unanimous consent last year. However, the House failed to pass a companion measure due to unrelated political disagreements.

Two months ago, Chairman Cassidy and nine co-sponsors reintroduced the OAA Reauthorization Act of 2025. The 91-page bill, S. 2120, would renew funding and strengthen services for older Americans. It was referred to the Senate HELP Committee the day it was introduced, where hearings, markups, and a committee vote are expected. If approved, it will move to the full Senate for consideration. As of press time, a companion bill had not yet been introduced in the House.

Chairman Cassidy’s co-sponsors include Senators Bernie Sanders, Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY, Rick Scott (R-FL), chair of the Senate Special Committee on Aging, Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Ben Ray Luján (D-NM), Ed Markey (D-MA), Markwayne Mullin (R-OK), and Susan Collins (R-ME).

Since its passage in 1965, the OAA has provided vital nutrition, social, and health services to millions of seniors. The legislation was originally sponsored by Rep. John E. Fogarty (D-RI) in the House and Sen. Lister Hill (D-AL) in the Senate, and signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on July 14, 1965.

Strengthening Programs for the Future

Although S. 2120 closely mirrors last year’s S. 4776, there are notable differences. The legislation would reauthorize OAA programs through FY 2030 and increase funding by 18% over the next four years. It also includes measures to promote innovation, strengthen program integrity, and provide better support for family caregivers and direct care workers. The bill aims to improve services for Tribal elders and older adults with disabilities, ensuring these populations can remain active and supported in their communities.

One key provision strengthens the Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program (LTCOP). The bill would establish a full-time National Director position and require the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to conduct a study of state ombudsman programs. This study would assess program effectiveness, staffing challenges, recommendations for improvement, and the adequacy of current staff-to-bed ratios. The legislation also calls for updated training standards for long-term care ombudsman volunteers.

The National Family Caregiver Support Program would also be expanded. The bill encourages easier access to caregiver services, removes barriers to obtaining help, and ensures supports are both accessible and practical. It specifically requires trauma-informed services and elder abuse prevention programs to be available, helping caregivers better manage challenges in their roles.

On elder abuse prevention, S. 2120 authorizes a clearinghouse for best practices, focusing on legal and protective services to strengthen state ombudsman programs, adult protective services, and related legal supports.

Bipartisan Support and Legislative Momentum

“The Older Americans Act is crucial in helping American seniors live healthy and independent lives in the settings they choose,” said Chairman Cassidy. “This legislation strengthens these programs, ensuring they meet the needs of older Americans now and in the future,” he says.

Sen. Scott also underscored the urgency of passing S. 2120 in a released statement. “I’m proud to help lead this bipartisan legislation to strengthen support for America’s older adults and reaffirm our commitment to helping them enjoy their golden years with dignity and independence,” he said. “As Chair of the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging, I understand how essential it is that more than 59 million older Americans have access to critical services made possible through the Older Americans Act. Our seniors have spent their lives building and serving this country, and this bill is one way we ensure they continue to be supported, respected, and valued,” he added.

“The OAA has been a lifeline for American seniors since its passage over half a century ago,” said Sen. Gillibrand in a statement on June 18. “This landmark legislation helps our nation’s seniors thrive by supporting programs that provide nutrition assistance, home-delivered and congregate meals, transportation, caregiver support, disease prevention, and more. We owe it to seniors to continue funding these programs so they can age with dignity and respect. As ranking member of the Senate Aging Committee, I am firmly committed to getting this bill passed with bipartisan support.”

Sen. Sanders’s statement echoed that message, highlighting the broad scope of OAA-funded services: “The Older Americans Act provides federal funding for many essential programs, including combating loneliness and isolation, job training, protections from abuse, rides to the doctor and grocery store, disease prevention, caregiver support, and help for older adults to live independently at home. Not only does the Act save lives and ease human suffering, it saves money. We can waste billions on emergency room visits and unnecessary hospital stays, or we can provide seniors with the resources they need to live healthier, more dignified lives.”

“The failure to reauthorize the OAA in 2024 had tragic consequences in 2025. One in particular was the elimination of the Administration of Community Living which runs OAA programs.  Also proposals (since rejected) to end funding for Adult Protective Services and ombudsman programs. When you are in legislative limbo bad stuff can happen. It’s time for that to end,” says Robert “Bob” Blancato, serving as National Coordinator of the bipartisan 3,000-member Elder Justice Coalition, the Executive Director of the National Association of Nutrition and Aging Services Programs and National Coordinator of the Defeat Malnutrition.

Advocacy and the Call to Action

National advocacy groups—including Consumer Voice, Argentum, the National Council on Aging, the National Association of Development Organizations, USAging, and the National Association of Nutrition and Aging Services Programs—are urging swift passage of S. 2120. These organizations stress that delaying re-authorization would put millions of vulnerable seniors at risk of losing essential supports.

With the many benefits the OAA delivers to Rhode Island’s older adults—and considering that the late Rep. John Fogarty of Rhode Island played a pivotal role in securing passage of the original legislation in 1965—it is only fitting that the state’s current senators take a leading role today. Senators Jack Reed (D-RI) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) should cosponsor S. 2120 and work closely with their Senate colleagues to ensure its passage. Since there is currently no companion measure in the House, Rhode Island’s Representatives Seth Magaziner and Gabe Amo must take the initiative—by urging their colleagues to introduce one, or by stepping forward themselves to lead the effort.

Congress must act before September 30 to prevent a lapse in funding. The well-being of millions of older Americans—and their ability to age in place at home with dignity — depends on it.

Senior Centers key provider in RI’s Long-Term Care Continuum 

Published in RINewsToday on September 19, 2022

Over nine years ago, this columnist penned a commentary, “Senior Centers, Not Just a Place to Play Bingo,” that appeared in the Pawtucket Times and Woonsocket Call.  As we celebrate National Senior Centers Month in September, today’s Senior Centers continue to take a wholistic view of providing programs and services to their older participants. They are providing programming and services that truly takes into account the body, mind and social needs of their members, aged 55 and up. As I stated years ago, “senior centers are not a place that our parents once visited years ago to just knit or play bingo.” That continues to be true, and even more so, today. 

“Every day, senior centers bring our grandparents, parents, older neighbors, and friends together to build community and share trusted services and information to help all age well,” said Dianne Stone, NCOA’s Associate Director of Network Development and Engagement in a statement announcing the September celebration of the nation’s Senior Centers. “Research shows that compared with their peers, people who attend senior centers have higher levels of health, social interaction, and life satisfaction,” she says.

“There’s never been a better time to come home to your senior center,” Stone said. “Come see everything your local center has to offer,” adds Stone.

Senior Centers continue to be a catalyst for mobilizing the creativity, energy, vitality, and commitment of the older participants, says Mayor Donald R. Grebien in a proclamation he released on September 1, recognizing September as Senior Citizens Month. The City’s Leon Mathieu Senior Center, like the 35 senior centers around the state, empower their older participants to take control of their own health and well-being and the health of their fellow participants, says the mayor. 

Established in the 1980s by the U.S. Administration on Aging, the centers programming has slowly evolved to encompass activities that encourage healthy aging and wellness. Senior Centers across the Ocean State offer activities and programs, case management and social services and public benefits counseling, also social and cultural programming, social and recreational opportunities, even offering a place to eat a nutritional meal.

Many of the Senior Centers have their own vans and drivers who transport seniors to and from their homes for shopping, social cultural activities, to medical appointments and into each Senior Center’s meal sites.

Even during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Senior Centers responded by connecting with their members by making health checks thru telephone calls, offering programs and services via internet and social media sites, and delivering meals to the homebound seniors. During the ongoing pandemic, Senior Centers continue to provide countless hours of support to older adults, and have become integral to health care delivery throughout Rhode Island by providing COVID-19 guidance home testing kits and vaccine education to their participants.

At Pawtucket’s Leon Mathieu Senior Center, health screenings, specifically taking blood pressure readings, are performed by nursing students from Rhode Island College and URI Pharmacy students discuss the importance of being compliant with taking prescribed medications, too. Proper nutritional counseling is also offered. 

Starting in church basements, many as small social clubs, the passage of the Older Americans Act in 1965, propelled Senior Centers into a key provider role in the nation’s long term care continuum of care.

Today, more than 10,000 Senior Centers serve one million older adults every day. In Rhode Island, 35 agencies, serving over 200,000 persons, are geographically spread out from Westerly to Woonsocket and from Foster to Tiverton. Some are managed by municipalities, others by nonprofit groups. While catering to serving the state’s burgeoning elderly population, some have expanded their mission to offer programs for young and middle-aged adults.

According to the state’s Office of Healthy Aging, Rhode Island’s older adult population is growing rapidly. Over 31 percent of Rhode Islanders are 55 or older versus 28 percent nationally, and our state has the highest proportion in the United States of those 85 or older. 

With the graying of Rhode Island, the state’s Senior Centers are offering programming and services to attract the state’s aging baby boomers by focusing on health and wellness, recreation, and lifelong learning.  Yes, Senior Centers are a key provider in the state’s long-term care continuum to keep aging boomers, healthy, independent and allow them to age in place in the community.

Providing resources for local senior programs should be a shared responsibility of federal, state, and local governments, says Maureen Maigret,  chair of the Long-Term Care Coordinating Council’s Aging in Community Subcommittee and a Board Member of Senior Agenda Coalition of Rhode Island (SACRI).  “It was frustrating to see drastic state cuts to these programs in the mid 1990’s and we were pleased funding was restored. Governor McKee put $200,000 in the current budget, with the idea this was a step toward to providing funding equal to ten dollars per person aged 65-plus in each community,” she notes. 

“Aging advocates such as the SACRI will be pushing to get to the ten dollar level,” says Maigret. As state funding increases, Maigret calls on local communities to continue to provide funding and resources to their local senior centers to meet projected population growth of their older adult residents.  

According to Maigret, research has shown their importance in slowing or preventing functional decline and promoting a good quality of life.

Today’s Senior Centers are not your parent’s bingo hall, as some still mistakenly believe. Why not visit the Leon Mathieu Senior Center or your local Senior Center during National Senior Center Month and you may even be surprised with what you find? Call the Leon Mathieu Senior Center for more details about its offered programs and services at 401/728-7582. Or go to https://pawtucketri.com/senior-center.

To find a Senior Center in your community go to https://agefriendlyri.org/tools-resources/senior-centers-rhode-island/./Herb Weiss

 

Cicilline Pushes for House Aging Committee

Published in Pawtucket Times on January 4, 2021

Yesterday, the 116th Congress came to an end, with the new Congressional session convening that day with the swearing in of lawmakers elected on Nov. 3, 2020.   Some political observers say that legislative gridlock during this Congress made it the least productive in the last fifty years.  GovTrack.us, reported that of 16,587 bills thrown into the legislative hopper, 252 became enacted laws, and 712 resolutions were passed.

During a Fox interview last February, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) candidly admitted he prevented the consideration of hundreds of bills passed by the House that were sent over to the Senate for consideration.   McConnell’s “Legislative Graveyard” created by his controlling the legislative agenda by blocking debate, markup and refusing to allow a vote on House proposed legislation, was widely reported by the media and documented in a 33-page report, “2020 Democracy Score Card,” released last September by Common Cause, a watch dog advocacy group.

The results of tomorrow’s Georgia Senate runoff will determine if the GOP can maintain legislative control of the Senate. If Senate Democratic candidates win their seats, the Senate Democratic caucus will have the majority with 50 Senate seats, with Vice President Kamala Harris having a tie breaking vote. But if McConnell, called “the Grim Reaper” by his critics, continues to maintains political control of the upper chamber, Democratic legislative proposals introduced to improve the quality of life of America’s seniors and to help those struggling to financially make ends meet, would be rejected.  

Legislative Proposals to be Reconsidered by New Congress

During the116th Congress, Washington, DC-based aging advocacy groups, including the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare (NCPSSM) , AARP, Social Security Works, Leadership Council on Aging, and National Council on Aging, pushed for passage of legislative proposals to enhance the quality of life of America’s seniors and to strengthen and expand Social Security and Medicare, to keep these programs fiscally sound.  As the new Congress begins, lawmakers might consider bringing back legislative proposals that were not enacted in the previous Congressional session because of a Republican-controlled Senate.  Here are a few legislative proposals that have some merit and I hope to see reintroduced this year:

Congressman John Larson (D-Conn.) called on Congress to finally address the Social Security “Notch” issue. By ignoring this issue, workers born in 1960 and 1961, would likely see lower Social Security retirement benefits in the future, charged NCPSSM.  Last session, Larson, who chairs the House Ways and Means Social Security Subcommittee, introduced the “Social Security COVID Correction and Equity Act,” to increase benefits for those born in 1960 and 1961 without impacting the benefits for any other beneficiary. 

Larson also introduced the “Social Security 2100 Act” to strengthen and expand Social Security.  The landmark legislation would keep the program financially healthy for more than 75 years, while boosting benefits for all retirees. Congress must work during the 117th session to protect and expand the nation’s Social Security program.

The late Maryland Congressman Elijah E. Cummings, Chair of the House Oversight Committee, introduced the “Lower Drug Costs Now Act” which the House passed last session, would allow Medicare to negotiate prescription prices with Big Pharma, which would save the government and seniors nearly $350 billion in drug costs. The bill would also expand traditional Medicare by adding dental, vision, and hearing benefits. 

Additionally, a bipartisan crafted bill, the “Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act,” introduced by Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), was not allowed to be considered on the Senate floor by Senate Majority Leader McConnell.  According to the Congressional Budget Office, this legislation would save taxpayers $95 billion, reduce out-of-pocket spending by $72 billion and finally reduce premiums by $1 billion.

Almost three months ago, the Social Security Administration announced that approximately 70 million Americans would see a meager 1.3 percent cost of living adjustment (COLA) increase to Social Security benefits and Supplemental Security Income.  With retirees experiencing financial difficulties during the pandemic, a $20 increase in their monthly check might not help them to pay for spiraling health care and drug costs, along with the expenses of purchasing personal protective equipment and cleaning supplies to keep them safe. 

Following the announcing of the 2021 COLA, Congressman Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), chair of the House Transportation Committee, introduced the “Emergency Social Security COLA for 2021 Act” to provide Social Security beneficiaries with a 3 percent increase (or a $250 per month flat increase) which would reduce the impact of the small 2021 COLA increase. 

With COVID-19 quickly spreading throughout the nation’s nursing homes and intermediate care facilities, U.S. Senators Bob Casey (D-Pa) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), “The Nursing Home COVID-19 Protection and Prevention Act,” to provide needed resources to facilities to protect frail residents and staff. Residents in these facilities are among the most vulnerable because of their age and underlying medical conditions.  Days after the introduction of the Senate bill, Congressman David N. Cicilline (D-R.I.), signed on as a cosponsor of the House version.  

This legislative proposal would help states implement strategies to reduce the spread of COVID-19 in congregate settings, including through the purchase of personal protective equipment (PPE) and testing and to support nursing home workers with premium pay, overtime and other essential benefits.

New Push to Reestablish House Aging Committee

“After a lifetime of hard work, seniors should be able to enjoy their retirement years with dignity and peace of mind,” says Rhode Island’s Cicilline. “It’s the best way to secure the future of Medicare and Social Security, bring down the cost of prescription drugs, and find solutions for housing, transportation and long-term care issues that are especially important to Rhode Island seniors,” he says.

A long-time advocate for seniors, Cicilline announces in this weekly commentary his intentions of reintroducing a House resolution in the 117th Congress to reestablish the House Aging Committee

During the previous three Congressional sessions, Cicilline, representing the state’s first legislative district, introduced a House Resolution (just 245 words) to reestablish a House Permanent Select Committee on Aging. Two of the times a Republican-controlled House blocked consideration of the House Resolution. 

According to Cicilline, the House can easily create an ad hoc (temporary) select committee by just approving a simple resolution that contains language establishing the committee—giving a purpose, defining membership, and detailing other aspects.  Funding would be up to the Appropriations Committee. Salaries and expenses of standing committees, special and select, are authorized through the Legislative Branch Appropriations bill.

The previous House Aging Committee was active from 1974 to 1993 (until it was disbanded because of budgetary issues) put the spot light on an array of senior issues including elder abuse, helped increase home care benefits for older adults and helped establish research and care centers for Alzheimer’s disease.  

Cicilline noted that a House Aging Committee would perform comprehensive studies on aging policy issues, funding priorities, and trends.  Like its predecessor, its efforts would not be limited by narrow jurisdictional boundaries of the standing committee but broadly at targeted aging policy issues, he notes.

“I look forward to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to get the job done,” says Cicilline.

Herb Weiss, LRI’12, is a Pawtucket writer covering aging, health care and medical issues. To purchase Taking Charge: Collected Stories on Aging Boldly, a collection of 79 of his weekly commentaries, go to herbweiss.com.

Updated on Jan. 4, 2021