SAGE gives senior center a cash donation

SAGE Foundation was founded in 2005 by former Glen Cove Mayor Vincent Suozzi as a nonprofit to help raise funds for the Glen Cove Senior Center. The assistance of the foundation has helped the center provide programs, staffing, and services for the city’s elderly. 

On March 31, SAGE Foundation members Carolynn Eipel, president, Lee DelValle, corresponding secretary, Pete Heilig, treasurer, and Anthony Jimenez, director of Glen Cove Veterans Affairs and a SAGE board member, presented a check of roughly  $22,600 to Christine Rice, executive director of Glen Cove Senior Center. 

Mayor Pamela Panzenbeck and Deputy Mayor Donna McNaughton were also at the event to show their support. 

“That additional money helps to offset what they received from like the county and the state,” Eipel said. “So, it makes a big difference.”

The funding will enable the center to keep its social workers, who assist members in housing, healthcare and other needs. They are currently available Monday through Friday, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and sometimes even later, Rice said. 

“The donations that we get,” DelValle said, “help us directly support a social worker here at the center, which is vital. And the programs and all the activities and programs that are done here at the center helps.” 

Over the years, Heilig stated, SAGE has been able to give the center over $150,000 in donations. The funds have helped give center members a chance to participate in fun activities, including musical shows and entertainment, mediation therapy, yoga chair therapy, dance therapy and Tai Chi classes. 

The donations have helped the center to buy equipment for their community, such as wireless tour guide headsets and program supplies; and to purchase and maintain programs such as Dakim BrainFitness to help members improve their cognitive abilities. 

The center receives its funding through grants from the United States Administration of Aging, the New York Office for the Aging, and the Nassau County Office for the Aging. 

All supplemental donations go through SAGE. Eipel mentioned that many community members have also made donations. 

“That's a big thing,” Eipel said. “So, we've had some people that were members here at the senior center that have died, and their families made a generous donation to the senior center through SAGE, and we pass it through to the senior center.” 

“People here really care about each other,” DelValle said. “And they support us as a foundation, so that we are able to support the city’s center, which is vital to this community. Our aging community here is large, and it's getting bigger.”

The center is trying to add additional programs for seniors since most coronavirus restrictions have been lifted. It has in the past provided bus trips for outings such as baseball games and to tour Sagamore Hill.  

“Now that we are past Covid restrictions, we are starting on our bus trips again,” Rice said. “We're really trying to add as many programs as we can, as the seniors are now becoming more comfortable coming back in and being among their friends and having lunch.”

DelValle said that the center was “incredible” to its members during the pandemic. She recalled how the center delivered hundreds of meals and continuously made daily wellness calls to check on the members. 

“The outreach here is really amazing,” DelValle said. “And the staff here is wonderful, and we feel very privileged to be able to help them. We're really very grateful to what they do here at the center.”

“There are so many programs that go on here that are so enriching for so many people,” Eipel said. “[With the SAGE donation] they're able to do so much more.” 

SAGE will be hosting its annual golf outing to help raise additional donations for Glen Cove’s Senior Center on June 6 at Glen Cove’s golf course. Tee-off will start at noon and box lunches and beverages will be provided. The fundraiser will include a dinner and cocktail hour at The Metropolitan, where there will be music, raffles, and an auction. Additionally, emergency service chiefs will be honored at the dinner. 

To register for the annual golf outing and to make donations to Glen Cove Senior Center, visit https://www.glencovesage.org/join-our-fundraisers/