The Need For

A Senior Center Addition

To the Editor:

I applaud the long-awaited new addition to the Senior Center. As a personal trainer who has taught exercise classes at the Newtown center and many other senior centers for ten years, I am excited about the possibility of expanding our fitness programming.

Today we are an active aging society looking for ways to maintain a healthy, active lifestyle to ensure we have energy as we age. Currently, we hold exercise classes in the main room of the center where everyone coming in or leaving the center walks through. Just to use the bathrooms you have to walk through the class!

If we had a separate room that could be utilized for exercise, we could offer the right programs to address the needs of our senior citizens.

Newtown has some wonderful retirement housing, but we need to put in our long-range planning a facility where appropriate activities and adequate parking could be offered. Retired or semiretired citizens are valuable assets to our town. Many give a great deal of volunteer time that contribute a wealth of community awareness. We should encourage this involvement by giving seniors a facility they are eager to go to. I work at other facilities where sharing space can present programming conflicts.

I look forward to the addition to the existing center, but do hope that future plans for a standalone facility will not be compromised.

Sincerely,

Pat Babbage

20 North Branch Road, Newtown                                  April 30, 2007