California senior centers offer critical services

By 2030, the number of Californians age 65 and older will likely outnumber those under 18. Some of these approximately 8.6 million residents will experience loss and grief, increasing feelings of loneliness.

But as CalMatters’ Joe Garcia explains, senior centers can offer vital respite — helping seniors live out their golden years in Golden State more meaningfully.

Ensuring that older Californians have meaningful social interactions and remain active in their communities is important to their physical and mental health. One in five older Californians live alone, and by 2023 American Surgeon General’s Consultation equates the long-term health effects of social isolation to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Social interaction is also one of the key parts of Gov. Gavin Newsom Aging Master Plan.

Subsidized lunch programs offered at gathering places are critical to fighting isolation: in 2024, these types of meals account for more than 2.3 million meals for older adults in Los Angeles City and County, a figure that also includes meals at senior centers and other groups for older adults.

At the Lincoln Heights Senior Citizen Center, social events, including raffle games and holiday parties — which in some cases can draw crowds of over a hundred people — cater to the mostly Hispanic members.

Group fitness classes at the Culver City Senior Center have helped members like Selvee Provost, 67. After losing her husband, Jim, to COVID-19, she began attending Tai Chi classes and met a new companion there, with whom she moved in.

• Rector: “I knew if I sat at home and kept thinking about Jim, I would get more and more depressed. That motivated me to come here and try a course or something – just try anything.”

Read the full story hereor leave the main conclusions. Also take a look images by a Los Angeles-based photojournalist Isadora Kosofsky, who documents the long-term effects of pandemic-related closures of senior centers.

MP Oh my god introduced a new legislative caucus Tuesday focused on California’s children and improving their quality of life. The Oakland Democrat said the bipartisan group of more than 40 state lawmakers will target proposals related to access to child care, foster youth, housing security and more.

• Bonta, at a press conference in Sacramento: “One in five California children live in poverty in the fourth largest economy in the world. We certainly know that this is driven by both federal policy and state policy. And we know that in California we can do better for our children.”

During the start of the assembly, Bonta also introduced two related bills: one that would established a grant program to “advance economic mobility for children and families who are disproportionately affected by intergenerational poverty,” and another that would establish a statewide goal of halving California’s child poverty rate within 10 years.

California leaders paid tribute to the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who died Tuesday at age 84. The civil rights activist and two-time presidential candidate died in Chicago of a rare brain disease, according to his family.

Governor Newsom in a statement recalled Jackson’s efforts for social justice in California, meeting with labor leader Cesar Chavez in the Central Valley to address farm workers’ rights in 1988 and protest racial injustice in Los Angeles and Oakland.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass called it “a tireless advocate” and the state assembly held a moment of silence on the floor in honor of Jackson. The California Legislative Black Caucus also expressed its condolences, saying that Jackson “never stopped pushing America to confront its conscience.”

• faction: “As we reflect on this centennial era of Black History Month, we are reminded that leaders like Reverend Jackson did not fight for symbolism, they fought for structural change, economic justice, voting rights and the full promise of democracy.”