Easley Senior Center Needs Financial Help

Easley may no longer have a Seniors Unlimited Center.

The center is currently closed and could remain so if a way forward isn't found.

Steve Crowe spoke to Easley City Council members Monday night on behalf of Seniors Unlimited.

“We're in a financial mess, to be very blunt,” Crowe said. “We had to close the Easley Center because of unsafe conditions. It rains about as much on the inside as it does on the outside.”

Part of the rainwater runs through the building's breaker panel, he said.

“That's enough to close the building (right there),” Crowe said. “Part of the ceiling has collapsed. Mold is growing inside the building. We don't have the funds to fix the building. We have no money to repair the building. There's just not enough funds to keep everything maintained.”

The Easley center is located at 401 Blair Street, the former Alice Elementary School site.

The building's five air conditioner units were stolen shortly after they closed the building, Crowe said.

“We serve meals to the seniors of Easley,” Crowe said.

Currently, Easley seniors wishing to take part in Seniors Unlimited meals and programs are being transported to the Liberty Center.

But that building is currently under foreclosure, Crowe said.

“We're trying to work something out there,” he said. “That's the kind of financial problems that we're having. We would like for see city council to consider doing something to help keep our facility open in Easley.”

At one time, Pickens County Seniors Unlimited had centers in Easley, Pickens, Liberty and Central. It sold the Pickens location, which is now operated as the Pickens Senior Center.

“They're doing great work up there for the seniors,” Crowe said.

“When we leave, Easley will have nothing for the seniors, that I'm aware of, besides Seniors Unlimited,” he said.

Some of the seniors served by the Easley center have written letters detailing what the center and its programs mean to them.

Many of their clients are living alone on fixed incomes and have no transportation.

“Without Seniors Unlimited, I would be homebound, depending on a neighbor to take me to the grocery store,” Crowe said.

The Easley center delivers 48 home-delivered meals and 20 congregant meals, Crowe said.

“They have exercise, line dancing, several classes that they have, they play pool and bingo, they work on puzzles” he said.

He spokes of one senior who had learned to quilt at the center.

The center serves about 30 seniors a day on average, Crowe said.

“We serve about 117 unduplicated clients at the Easley center and another 52 at the Central center,” he said. “An unduplicated client – if we do five meals a week –, that's only one person, that's one unduplicated person. That 117, that's at least five times that much.”

The Easley center delivers meals to 82 unduplicated clients in Easley.

“They go to the center to work on puzzles, to exercise and socialize,” Crowe said. “For some of them, that's the only place they go. Without us delivering the meals or picking them up and taking them to the center, some of them – we've got story on top of story about how they don't have any food. We need some help from somewhere.”

One way the city could help is with the building's repairs. Another way is suggesting ways to significantly increase the center's revenue.

Crowe said SU officials have no problems with locating in Liberty, but that the Easley facility has three times as many seniors as the other two.

“Easley is by far the biggest facility we have,” Crowe said.

Easley's seniors can't afford to drive to the Central center and back for a meal.

He wondered if there was any property in Easley that could be used rent-free for the operation of the senior center.

Mayor Larry Bagwell said he didn't know if the former Simpson Academy site, now the home of the Dream Center of Pickens County, had extra space the center could use.

But he said the issue was very important to both himself and council members. He's asked the city's grant writer to look into opportunities for the center.

“We will be looking into the situation and try to come up with something,” Bagwell said. “I pledge that we will be looking at helping you somehow.”