SAN DIEGO ISN’T PREPARED FOR COMING RETIREE BOOM
Who do you know over age 60? Seventy? Eighty or older?
When this question is asked, stories pour in of recently retired parents, relatives, neighbors, those staying active and people who are home-bound and of how they are being cared for, who is caring for them and where there are senior orphans with no support network. Everyone knows someone. Everyone has a story.
That’s because San Diego County’s senior population is dramatically rising. By 2030, our region is expected to be home to almost 1 million people over the age of 60.
The rapid aging of our population presents an array of new challenges and opportunities — from an alarming rise in poverty and social isolation among older adults to a growing group of seniors eager to stay engaged in our community as activists, mentors and volunteers.
This new wave of older adults is expected to have longer life spans, smaller family and friend support networks, and wider ranges of housing, transportation, caregiving, health care and technology challenges.
For decades, we’ve been hearing forecasts of this incoming generation of retiring baby boomers and growing population of adults over 75. Now that it’s arrived, this question must be asked: Is San Diego County prepared?
The short answer: no.
We need to do some serious rethinking, reinvesting and retooling of our public services, transportation system, health care, housing, food security and, perhaps most importantly, our countywide system of community senior centers.
In recent years, policymakers and civic leaders have begun taking some promising first steps to address the needs of our quickly growing older population, but the county’s ecosystem of services, resources and facilities to support older adults is still sorely lagging.
A big step forward is recognizing the critical role senior centers play in offering a wide range of health, nutrition, recreation, financial education and other social service programs necessary to maintain, sustain and improve the lives of older adults.
A coalition of local community and nonprofit leaders, aging experts and other key stakeholders are banding together under the recently formed San Diego Seniors Community Foundation to rally public attention and political backing for the importance of senior centers and the critical support network our older adults need.
But unfortunately it’s not just the region’s population that’s aging. A 2019 assessment study by San Diego Seniors Community Foundation found that many of our region’s existing senior centers are outdated and unprepared for the senior population increase.
Currently, San Diego County has 28 senior centers in communities from San Ysidro to Oceanside and Coronado to Borrego Springs. Yet San Diego Seniors Community Foundation reports that existing senior centers serve only about 8 percent of the region’s total senior population — and many of these centers are underfunded and understaffed and lack sufficient programming.
Other findings about area senior centers: 75 percent are more than 30 years old, nearly a quarter have no full-time employees, 50 percent are in areas with poor or limited public transportation options, just over 20 percent have computer labs with adequate hardware, only 18 percent have a fitness room and just one has an onsite gymnasium.
That’s why we’re sounding the alarm and issuing the San Diego Master Plan for Senior Centers. This report is a direct response to California’s Master Plan on Aging and Gov. Gavin Newsom’s call for counties and cities to create specific action plans for what’s needed in their communities.
The San Diego Master Plan for Senior Centers underscores the disparities that exist in our region with respect to accessing quality senior centers, and lays out a plan for ensuring that all local older adults — no matter where they live or their socioeconomic status — have a place in their neighborhood to learn, grow, socialize and thrive.
The report, for example, finds that some communities are lacking a facility of any kind and recommends the creation of senior centers for Barrio Logan, Clairemont, Eastlake/Otay Mesa, El Cajon and Santee/Lakeside.
Our master plan calls for investing approximately $147 million to start creating a thoroughly modern, interconnected network of sophisticated, state-ofthe-art senior centers. Specific amenities may include fitness centers, open space, technology resources, gymnasiums and/or community aquatic pools.
What matters most is that all San Diego County’s older residents have the opportunity to age gracefully, surrounded by family, friends and community, and to have access to robust resources and sustainable services to live their best quality of life. That’s a benefit to the entire community.
Building and upgrading senior centers is essential for the health and well-being of our region’s older adults. And we should all want that for ourselves, our aging parents and all seniors in our community — now and for generations to come.
Kelly