Audio By Carbonatix
Independent Journalism in Miami Needs You
We need to raise $10,000 by August 9 to support the reporting our community depends on. Reader support keeps us independent and is playing a larger role in funding local journalism and shaping what comes next. If you believe independent local journalism matters, make a contribution today.
“>
“Eliminating funding for these programs is literally taking food from the mouths of our senior citizens,” Mayor Tomas Regalado told The Miami Herald.
“This doesn’t just take away food from the elderly, but it hurts a lot of businesses that provide to these programs,” Commissioner Wifredo “Willy” Gort said this morning on Spanish radio according to Naked Politics. “We have to work 24 hours a day to see how we can substitute that missing money…A lot of these people only have one meal a day, which they receive at the senior center.”
The money for the center was put in the Senate version of the budget by Republican Senator Joe Negron of Stuart at the urging of the area’s Republican Senator Republican Miguel Diaz de la Portilla. Diaz de la Portilla says he was not notified by Scott that the funding would be vetoed.
The program has lost other sources of funding as the economy tanked, while the number of seniors seeking meals increased.
Follow Miami New Times on Facebook and Twitter @MiamiNewTimes.
