The Soldotna Senior Center has just lost hundreds of thousands in funding from two separate sources, back to back — a grant from the state Department of Health, and nondepartmental funding from the city of Soldotna.
Those losses are part of a chain of events that ended with the center firing its executive director last Friday. Then on Tuesday, the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly still voted to fund the center as part of its annual budget — though questions remain.
The senior center is run by an independent nonprofit, established in 1986, that serves about 300 members. It provides meals and transportation for area seniors.
But former center employees and board members allege a culture of mismanagement at the center. And last month, nearly a dozen people brought their concerns to the Soldotna City Council, also alleging unjust firings and the loss of important grants. Many who testified had complaints with then-Director Loretta Spalding and demanded an audit of the center’s finances.
Former board member Mike Sweeney testified to the city council.
“Losing the money that I’ve been told that we’re losing in the last year and a half, that’s a big concern,” Sweeney said. “I remember when the senior center was built. This community means a lot to me, and I think the senior center is in trouble.”
Ultimately, the city council voted unanimously to slash the city’s contribution to the center for the next fiscal year from $12,700 to $0, and said it needed to see an audit before returning to full funding. The center hasn’t committed to an audit, yet.
City council member Linda Farnsworth-Hutchings spoke in support of the defunding.
“I feel that we have a terrible break in trust, with what is going on at the senior center, and I really feel that we do need an audit,” she said. “I think the fact that things looked really good in 2020 and have spiraled down, we really need an audit, so I, of course, will be supporting zero funding for FY24.”
That change in funding is on top of a loss of more than $350,000 from the state over this fiscal year and the next two, through a grant that covers food and transportation costs. The organization missed the initial deadline for the application, then appealed, but wasn’t successful in recouping the funds.
In a letter notifying Spalding that the center had not received its grant, then-Health Commissioner Adam Crum writes that the application had many issues, including non-specific answers, missing documents and “copied/pasted answers from previous responses.”
At the Soldotna City Council meeting, Spalding said she was still working with the state to get that grant reinstated. However, a spokesperson for the Department of Health confirmed there was no possibility of reinstating the grant, because all funding had already been distributed.
Last Friday, Spalding was removed as director of the center, though no reason has been publicly given by the center’s board. Attempts to reach the senior center board’s president and vice president for comment were unsuccessful. Spalding said at the time she was fired, she was on a pre-planned vacation. She said the senior center board told her she was fired because she was missing an important borough meeting to discuss funding for the center.
“However, I absolutely made clear that I could fly back, I could be there by Zoom,” Spalding said. “So that was the reason they said, because I’m not there to attend the meeting.”
Spalding said she’s planning to file a defamation lawsuit against the city for the comments made by the public at the council meeting. She said the management problems predate her, and that she has her own concerns with financial mismanagement at the center that she said she discovered upon taking up the director role.
At a borough committee meeting Tuesday, Lisa Riley introduced herself as the center’s new executive director as of Friday. Riley said she has worked at the senior center for the past five years, during her testimony from the city council meeting.
It’s uncertain at this time what the funding drop will mean for the center. However, the center still has at least one major source of funding, intact.
The Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly took up the senior center budget Tuesday night as part of its yearly budget process. The Soldotna Senior Center was set to receive about $130,000 in the proposed budget.
Again, former employees and board members asked the assembly not to fund the center. But Borough Mayor Peter Micciche encouraged the speakers to not reject the borough funding.
“Do you really want to challenge the funding that comes from the borough through community assistance to the senior center, and jeopardize the little bit of funding that remains secure?” Micciche said. “Because you have lost significant funding that is important to many seniors in our community.”
The assembly unanimously voted to pass the budget, meaning the senior center will receive that funding, pending a standard audit prior to payment.
