Town Of Bedford Senior Advocate Rosemary Vorel Offers Annual Update

Press release from the Town of Bedford:

Our Senior Advocate, Rosemary Vorel, gave an update on Tuesday, 2/7/23, to the Town Board on the goals, strategies and accomplishments undertaken in the last year with respect to Bedford seniors and their families.

Rosemary works to get all seniors to register with her so that in case of a crisis, she is authorized to help them find resources. She does outreach to seniors directly and through many of the Recreation and Parks Department events and programs. If you know a senior, please encourage them to call the Rec Department and sign up with Rosemary!

In an effort to connect seniors to resources, Rosemary conducted COVID information outreach, offered a Driver and Pedestrian Safety and Options program and a Caring Circles Training, hosted area vendors who are part of the Westchester County Senior Programs’ Livable Communities Northeast Collaborative, organized Caregiver and Movement/visual Difficulties Support Groups, connected seniors with the NYS Department of Agriculture’s Farmer’s Market Checks, hosted the workshop “Getting Help Paying for Aides and Nursing Care,” and and the December Senior Resources Event. She has been instrumental in offering Arts and Crafts sessions for 55+ and the art exhibit that has resulted from those sessions at BHCH.

One of Rosemary’s major goals when she became the full-time Senior Advocate in February 2022 was to increase overall registration in the program and to create more awareness regarding the support available through her office. One year ago, 115 seniors were registered to receive resources from the senior advocate. Today, 201 elder residents have registered. As Rosemary points out, this increase demonstrates that while efforts to increase registration have been successful, this is a small percent of the total number of elders eligible to register. She hopes that people don’t wait until they are having a crisis, before they think of calling the office at 914-864-3715.

This press release was produced by the Town of Bedford. The views expressed here are the author’s own.