Sunday’s column: An SOS for senior services
Dwight Burdette | Wikimedia Commons
Ron Adkins was on the phone Thursday and he was fit to be tied. He’s a former insurance broker, bail bondsman and bar owner from the Cave Spring area. He’s also a landlord and player in Roanoke County Republican politics.
He launched his spiel with “I’m no bleeding-heart liberal,” which is perhaps the understatement of the year. “I’m a Republican and I’m a conservative. But when it comes to people not eating, that’s where I draw the line.”
Adkins and many others around Virginia are incensed by one of 88 amendments that Gov. Bob McDonnell has proposed to the state budget. It would eliminate a $2.5 million appropriation the General Assembly included in the 2013-15 state budget for 15 of Virginia’s 25 regional offices on aging, which provide human services to the state’s homebound seniors.
Furious advocates for seniors have deluged state lawmakers’ offices with phone calls and email about this issue.
“This is by far the most feedback we’ve gotten on any amendment,” said Del. Greg Habeeb, R-Salem. Along with Del. Chris Head, R-Botetourt Co., he was one of the lawmakers who added the extra $2.5 million in senior-agency funding into the budget.
The legislature will vote Monday on that amendment and the others. And hanging in the balance is money for already cash-strapped service agencies.
The appropriation is necessary because of a new formula the Virginia Department for the Aging is using to allocate federal money for senior-service programs. That’s based on the U.S. census count of elderly, poor and minority residents in different parts of the state.
The fact is, the senior citizen population grew in all 25 of Virginia’s senior agency regions. But according the census, it grew more in Northern Virginia than it did elsewhere. So the flow of money has been redirected.
READ THE REST OF THIS COLUMN HERE.
May 13, 2012 - 6:00 AM
Typical theme by Dan: Find some “who’s normallly conservative” to take a shot at Republican leadership.
This sounds like a golden opportunity for liberals to come to the rescue with their own resources. Don’t sit idly by and watch seniors starve, liberals. Take matters into your own hands.
Oh wait That would imply you’re sincerely concerned.
Meals on Wheels is looking for drivers. They’re harder to find now that gasoline is so expensive. Why don’t so many of you liberals who are free during the daytime take meals to seniors?
Putting entertainment above people eating, how much more callous can McDonnell get?
I was at a non-political event with John Edwards yesterday and was around him for only a few minutes. During that time three people approached him and asked that he try to do something about McDonnell’s heartless change to the budget.
It appears even local Republicans are waking up to what’s going on in Richmond these days.
This is inperfect harmony with today’s extremist Republican philosophy.
There’s no bad bill or appropriation that puts more money into the pockets of the 1%. And there’s no good bill or appropriation that helps those lazy good for nothiong leeches that won’t get up out of their wheel chairs and go help themselves. It’s more of the “I’ve got mine. Screw you,go get your own philosdophy that permeates Republican politics. Old fashioned Republicans who were responsible citizens, willing to compromise for the good of the country are being drummed out of the party
and will soon be a thing of the past.
@#2
My dear LIBERAL husband drives (using his own gas) for MOW on a regular basis. My LIBERAL elderly parents volunteer weekly at a food pantry. What do you do?
#2 You’ve got lots of time on your hands suzie, so why don’t you volunteer to escort some of those rich movie makers around instead of sending them millions that they don’t need?
BTW, we all notice that you complain about tax dollars going to deliver meals to poor elderly people, but NOT A SINGLE WORD in protest of money going to trillionaire liberal movie folk. Why is that?
My dear LIBERAL husband drives (using his own gas) for MOW on a regular basis. My LIBERAL elderly parents volunteer weekly at a food pantry. What do you do?
Every time I answer that question, hon, I get accused of bragging. Let’s just say I do quite a bit more than my part and leave it at that.
If the problems of poverty and privation could be fixed by private people and organizations, they would have done so by now. Poor communities cannot afford what affluent communities can for starters. It is a simplistic, unchristian and ignorant solution to posit. But typical.
The easiest thing in the world to do is spend other people’s money.
How much of that $2.5 million went to pay salaries for bureaucrats?
(crickets, crickets)
Henry makes a good point, “The easiest thing in the world to do is spend other people’s money”. And the tax and economic structure of our nation proves that the rich and their businesses get to spend a LOT of “other people’s money”. But of course that is fine with Henry. As long as no poor person gets any of it, all is right with the world.
The easiest thing in the world to do is spend other people’s money.
Sorry, left off the charts that prove it.
http://www.businessinsider.com/15-charts-about-wealth-and-inequality-in-america-2010-4#the-gap-between-the-top-1-and-everyone-else-hasnt-been-this-bad-since-the-roaring-twenties-1
#11 Well, I don’t know, Henry. Why don’t you tell us since you brought it up. I’m not doing your homework for you.
I don’t expect Henry will answer.
Suzie…
Everytime you use the term HON…
It makes me think of some 30 year old
woman pregnant for the 5th time smacking gum
in a laundromat.
Are you sure thats teh image you want people to have…”Hon”:
Good idea, gdad. Let’s read the story and find out. Whoops. They left that part out. I guess it didn’t fit the agenda.
Don’t stop with feeding seniors. The OWS protestors are having a very tough time making it in America. We need to set aside a few million to feed them and then burp them.
terps, you’ve got it backwards. The Occupy Roanoke folks set up a kitchen every weekend in Elmwood Park. They feed others. They charge nothing for the food.
Not one red cent of taxpayer money goes to Occupy Roanoke. Is that what so burns you up about them? That you can’t complain they’re wasting taxpayer dollars?
# 15 It’s funny Joe, it makes me think of that 30 year old woman’s cigarette smoking, 50 yr old mom.
It does not appear to be one monolith but the individual agencies seem to be offering a lot of good for 2.5 million.
http://www.vaaaa.org/agencies/
OWS protesters are cost local governments tens of millions of dollars in damages and man hours. The leftwing handlers behind these mindless sheep should be forced to foot the bill.
24. Considering the state of Wall Street today, the Government ought to be paying the protesters to march. J P Morgan obviously paid no attention to Dodd Frank except to lobby to be able to ignore the rules.
Why is Screwzie’s name now showing up as a link, but if you click on it, you get a phishing warning? What the hell is she trying to pull?
If I click on John Wilburn’s name, it takes me straight to his website.
WTF, Screwzie? What, exactly, are you up to now?
Oh so in your totalitarian world, no one should ever protest because it might cost money?
Contra,
It appears that Suzie has self-entered her email address in the blank to enter a poster’s Web site.
That part of the form is optional; nobody has to fill it out.
Contra,
I was excited about it too, but I’m thinking Suzie just accidentally clicked on the space bar in the “website” field, making the system think something was entered in there. Of course, she would never admit to such a human goof and laugh about it like the rest of us, no, I expect her to claim that was her slick way of putting her name in blue because she prefers it.
Big game tomorrow night Gdad
I want my name in blue too! Does it make us special?
RICHMOND – Governor Bob McDonnell has officially asked for a budget amendment to be withdrawn that would have aligned state funding for Area Agencies for the Aging with recent census numbers. Instead, funding for the agencies will continue to be allocated in the same manner as prior years.
Nah, John, Screwzie will just claim that Dan altered her post/email just to mess with her like she claimed he did with her Amanda-avatar. You and I both know Screwzie never makes mistakes. She never misspells words or omits words, either.