COA serves nearly a quarter of all County seniors

Nearly 24 percent of St. Joseph County’s 12,488 residents 60 years of age and older are receiving some type of service from the county’s Commission on Aging, a report last week showed.
If those numbers hold in 2014-15, it means taxpayers will provide about $760 of funding per client to deliver everything from nutrition services and in-home care to senior activities and information.
COA director Lynn Coursey said federal Census data shows about 20 percent of St. Joseph County residents, or nearly 12,500, now qualify for COA services based on their age. Statistics show almost one in four seniors in the county are connected to the COA.
But the COA’s client numbers have spent the last 10 years trying to regain the peak reached in 2003- 04 when 3,234 unduplicated clients were on its rolls. That number dropped to a low of 2,683 in 2006- 07 and has been riding slight gains and declines ever since.