Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Federal funding formula changes coming for Area Agencies on Aging
The Pennsylvania Department of Aging announced that in compliance with federal requirements, it will be updating its formula for how Pennsylvania distributes federal funds authorized by the Older Americans Act among the 52 Area Agencies on Aging (AAAs) that serve the commonwealth.
“In the 10 years since this formula has been updated, Pennsylvania’s older adult population has experienced growth and demographic changes,” said Pennsylvania Secretary of Aging Robert Torres. “These changes need to be incorporated in how the department calculates the distribution of federal funds for aging services to the AAAs.
“We undertook a thoughtful, months-long process, during which we looked not only at age as a factor of need, but also considered other factors such as older adults in minority populations, rural populations, living in poverty and living alone.”
The Intrastate Funding Formula, or IFF, is what PDA uses to distribute federal funding to the AAA network for administering aging programs and services. PDA collaborated with the AAA network during the planning and development of the proposed IFF.
The updated IFF is anticipated to shift about $8.8 million in federal funding among the AAAs. Most AAAs will experience a federal funding increase as a result of the revised formula. A phased-in implementation over multiple years will be used to help AAAs who see a decrease in funding adjust their programming budgets and consider alternative funding sources to minimize impacts, and will also allow AAAs receiving increased funding to plan and build their capacity to use the anticipated increased funding efficiently.