AAA HEAD RESPONDS TO CHARGES; BUDGET, FORMULA CHANGE EXPLAINED

Glenda Hoffmeister, executive director of the Southeast Missouri Area Agency on Aging (AAA), reacted Friday to a New Madrid lawmaker's charges that the agency's operations are inefficient and unfair.

Rep. Gene Copeland, D-New Madrid, last week proposed legislation that would give regents at Southeast Missouri State University the authority to named the Southeast Missouri AAA's director.

Copeland has said the measure would improve delivery of services to senior citizens in Southeast Missouri. Several state legislators have argued that administrative costs of running the 18-county Southeast Missouri AAA are too high and that a new formula for distributing federal nutrition funds has reduced allocations to several nutrition centers.

But Hoffmeister said the new funding formula is "fairer" than any other formula options available.

She said a committee of seven agency board members met over eight months time to create the new formula for distributing funds to the 38 area senior centers.

"Because the agency cannot afford to purchase all of the meals served at each center, the committee attempted to arrive at an equitable amount for each center based on the number of meals served in fiscal year 1992," Hoffmeister said.

The new formula doesn't take into account local contributions or fund-raising dollars, or an additional USDA commodity cash allocation of about 58 cents per eligible meal served.

The formula assigns each center a base amount relative to the center's size and how many meals it must serve daily. From there, the new formula grouped centers by the number of meals served and allocated a specific dollar amount per meal, Hoffmeister said.

"Centers serving the same number of meals will now receive the same amount of funding," she added.

Hoffmeister said this system is the most fair of the several options the board was considering.

But opponents to the plan have said the Older Americans Act required that the board consider the economic ability and status of the county when allocating funds for senior centers.

Hoffmeister said that because of the region's demographics, a plan based solely on economic need would essentially have shut down centers in several counties.

"The number one priority of the plan was to ensure that all 38 senior centers remain open and continue to serve meals to senior participants," she said.

Copeland also has contended that Hoffmeister overspends on administration costs.

But Hoffmeister said that based on the Southeast Missouri AAA's current budget, administrative costs are only 7.4 percent of the total budget, which ranks as the second lowest in the state.

Brian Forbis, director of the Missouri Division of Aging, also has said agency's administrative costs aren't "out of line."

Hoffmeister said some of the confusion might be the result of changes in the definition of "administrative costs." Under the change, individual program budgets are now included with the administration budget.

The result is a "radical increase" from $151,000 to $328,000 in administrative costs.

"But in reality, this is nothing more than a regrouping of program budgets," Hoffmeister explained. "These budgets are not new or increased, but are actually transfers from other budgets."

She said additional confusion arose when Rep. Bob Ward, D-Bonne Terre, charged that the agency recently budgeted $18,000 for a "public affairs specialist."

The title of "information and referral director" a position at the agency since the mid-1970s was simply changed in the budget to "public information director," she said. The salary for the position comes not from the administration budget, but from the "information and referral program" budget.

"We have nothing to hide," Hoffmeister said. "I am anxious to get this problem behind us so that we can again focus our full attention to the problems and concerns of the elderly population of our area."

Copeland's bill, which is co-sponsored by Ward has drawn some criticism because of concerns from participants at some nutrition sites that the university will try to drastically change senior center operations.

But Copeland said his bill aims to enable senior centers to become more than nutrition sites, by cutting administration costs and increasing services.

Copeland said the agency spends $320,000 on administrative costs and $860,000 for services. He contends the university would be able to provide the staff support so that more activities could take place, diverting administrative costs to services.

Last month, Copeland, Ward, House Budget Chairman Chris Kelly, D-Columbia, and Rep. Marilyn Williams, D-Dudley, asked the Missouri Division of Aging to conduct a limited "Operational Management Review" of the Southeast Missouri AAA office.

The review would start this week and Copeland said he thinks it should address a lot of the concerns people have about the agency's operations and make recommendations on how it can use funds more efficiently.