Getting your "Hand on Huntington"

By Tim Healy
tim.healy@newsday.com

The “Hands on Huntington” program wants to get the public’s opinion next week on how to improve access to social, recreational, occupational and health services for people over the age of 60 living in the shaded area of the map above.

The program is trying to establish what’s known as a “naturally occurring retirement community,” in an effort to help older residents stay in their homes while remaining active. The program, funded by the state, is a joint effort of the Town of Huntington and the F.E.G.S Health and Human Services System, working with the North Shore-LIJ Health System and the Suffolk Y Jewish Community Center.

The program held its first meeting of a citizens advisory committee on July 26 in the Huntington Senior Activities Center on Park Avenue, where about two dozen residents over 60, or relatives taking care of them, turned out to learn about the program and suggest services that could be provided or improved. Questions were raised about health programs, transportation and volunteering.

The committee, which is still accepting members, is to meet again on Thursday morning, Aug. 23, at 10 in the senior center on Park Avenue, “basically to continue to explore the priorities of the seniors themselves,” said Kathy Rosenthal, a vice president at F.E.G.S, “so that we can build a program that directly addresses their needs and also explores their skills and abilities in ways that we can tap for volunteer programming and participation in the program overall.”

“The bigger the group grows,” Rosenthal added, “the more you get a varied response in terms of what people’s needs are.”

There are 54 such naturally occurring retirement community programs in the state, Rosenthal said, with many of them in New York City. F.E.G.S. is involved in one in New Hyde Park. To qualify, a census tract must have fewer than 2,000 residents, with at least 40 percent over the age of 60.

Tina Block, the director of Hands on Huntington, told the group on July 23 that the program and the outreach leading up to it would be “an opportunity for people to connect with each other.”

What about people outside the zone?

“The can certainly come to the table and help us talk about this,” Rosenthal said. “They can be advocates for us. Helping us advocate for more dollars to expand this kind of program and create other NORC supportive services and programs”

“And the wonderful thing about the Town of Huntington is that it’s got such a rich slate of service for the seniors that we would never turn someone away,” she continued. “Our Hands on Huntington social worker would absolutely help in steering them in a direction to meet whatever needs they have…and most of the needs can be met by the town. What they don’t get is this intensive nursing and social work … services."