MOUNT VERNON – The Station Break Senior Center on Howard Street in Mount Vernon is opening up again on June 1, more than a year after it shut down due to COVID-19.
“We’re so excited,” Meredith Lowther, director of the center, told the Mount Vernon News. “But we’re going to take it a little slow because the virus is still out there.”
In the beginning, the center will only be open a couple of days a week for a few hours with limited activities, Lowther cautioned.
“We’re just trying to get back into the swing of things and then add more things as COVID numbers keep dropping,” she said. “As things progress, more activities will be added in and we’ll have longer hours.”
The center is not requiring seniors to be vaccinated for COVID-19 before entering the center.
“We will have vaccinated and unvaccinated clients here,” Lowther said. “We want everyone to feel comfortable while they are here.”
Rules on medical privacy prevent the center from asking clients whether they have been vaccinated.
“Some people have shared that information with us,” she said. “There seems to be more people who have been vaccinated than not. We just want our clients to know that the virus is still out there and people can still get it.”
Many of the restrictions have been lifted by the State of Ohio, Lowther said. The center still has home COVID-19 testing kits that will be available for clients. The center itself, however, will not be required to administer tests.
“If we see that someone might appear to have symptoms, we can send them home with a test kit,” she said. “They can either do it that way or they can go to a health facility and be tested.”
The center will do temperature checks, at least in the early days of the reopening, Lowther said.
Initially, seniors will participate in activities — such as playing the game Pictionary — while sitting at tables, the director said.
“There won’t be a lot of getting up, exercising, things like that,” Lowther said. “I’m hoping to start adding more of that starting in July. We will not be taking any field trips at this time. We’re going to try to do more outside.”
The center will hold a fundraiser on June 11 to raise money for an outdoor courtyard, she said.
Before the center closed in March of 2020 because of COVID-19, it was bustling with activity, particularly on Fridays.
“We would have chair exercises, chair volleyball,” Lowther said. “We would have crafts or a cooking class going on. Fridays, there was always bingo. There was always something for them to do while they were here.”
