Community Corner
Silver Spring 'Neighbors-Helping-Neighbors' Village Gears Up
A new senior village network springs up in Silver Spring.
There's a new village in town.
No—not a new postal code, but a neighbors-helping-neighbors organization that brings people together.
Silver Spring Village has been in the works for more than two years, and will "go live" on Sept. 29.
The village has 21 paid members and 32 volunteers. The members are mostly senior citizens who wish to "age in place," while the volunteers are there to help the seniors. A full membership is $350 for an individual and $450 for a couple, according to the organization's website.
In "aging-in-place" communities and organizations (commonly called "villages"), volunteers help community members with grocery shopping, getting to doctors' appointments, and performing household tasks like shoveling snow, changing light bulbs and other small tasks that help seniors live in their own homes, rather than move into retirement communities.
Silver Spring Village also will provide referral information to members looking for suggestions—for example—for contractors to do home improvement work.
And, plans are underway for social and educational activities, and for local business discounts for members.
The village celebrates its opening on Sunday, Oct. 20, at the Silver Spring Regional Services Center (One Veterans Place, Silver Spring), from 2 to 4 p.m., with music, food and other fun activities. The event will be free-of-charge and open to all. The event's keynote speaker will be Stuart Rosenthal, chair of the Maryland Commission on Aging and editor of The Beacon Newspapers.
Visit the village's online calendar for the list of member events scheduled for September and October.
Senior villages are becoming more and more common in the area. There are at least a half a dozen villages in the county, and more are in formation, Bethesda-Chevy Chase Patch reported last March.
The village movement got its start on Beacon Hill in Boston in 1999. Bethesda resident Charles Kauffman sat in on an early planning meeting for the Beacon Hill Village, and has provided insight on the village formation process to Montgomery County villages.
"We know that the population in Montgomery County is growing older, and we know that we’re going to need more ... support," he added.
>>>Read more about senior villages in Montgomery County on Bethesda-Chevy Chase Patch.
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