Hartford weighs options for improving Bugbee Senior Center

WHITE RIVER JUNCTION — Hartford officials are studying options to improve the Bugbee Senior Center, from making it compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act to building an entirely new facility.

Another option could include expanding the hours the center operates to spread out when the programs take place so that more people can attend. The Bugbee, located at 262 N. Main St., is open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Other community groups use the Bugbee for events and gathering space when it is not being use for activities for older adults.

“People are living longer and healthier lives,” Mark Bradley, executive director of the Bugbee and the White River Council on Aging, said during an interview last week. “As we have more older adults, that means more needs for programs.”

Bradley is a member of the Bugbee Senior Center Building Renovation Committee, a group of residents, town officials and other interested parties, that will begin meeting later this summer to consider a variety of options for the center.

“It could be anything from demolition and rebuilding, to modest renovations to bring it up to code or more extensive recommendations to make it a building that will serve the needs for decades to come,” Hartford Town Manager John Haverstock said in an interview last week.

The committee is not limited to those options, he added, and could suggest something else entirely.

The town owns the Bugbee, which was built in 1980. The White River Council on Aging occupies the space and runs activities for older adults, including nutrition programs and exercise classes.

Bugbee’s annual operating budget is around $650,000. The majority of its funding comes from grants, donations and federal funding through the Older Americans Act, Bradley said. The center is about 6,000 square feet.

In 2023, the town commissioned a feasibility study of the Bugbee and used about $40,000 in funds from the American Rescue Plan to pay for it. The study, which was completed in April, identified the building’s deficiencies.

“The interior has not been sufficiently updated in response to the 1990 adoption of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA),” the study said. “For the building to comply, it requires the reconfiguration of hallways, doors, offices, and bathrooms.”

The study suggested several renovation options, starting with a “budget conscious approach,” that would improve kitchen space and accessibility, including automatic doors at an estimated cost of $900,000. The projected cost of a more extensive renovation, which would include relocating bathrooms and the main entrance, came in at roughly $1.6 million.

The price tag for building a new senior center was about $5.9 million, the study showed.

Haverstock stressed that these are preliminary figures.

Volunteers and participants who were at the Bugbee last Thursday pointed to parts of the center they’d like to see fixed, from stained ceiling tiles to enlarging rooms so that more people can participate in programs.

“It’s just old,” said Allen Albrecht, of Wilder, a member of the Bugbee committee. Albrecht has volunteered at the Bugbee for around 15 years in the dining room for congregate meals and as a home-delivered meals driver, among other tasks.

“We have leaks,” he said, pointing to a few stains on the drop ceiling tiles. “We need new floors, we need new rugs.”

Programs, including exercise classes, regularly fill up and rooms have become crowded as a result.

“We’ve outgrown the size of the building,” said Albrecht, 74, who served as interim director before Bradley was hired in 2020.

Since 2023 — the first year without any COVID-19 restrictions or closures — the Bugbee has seen a 14% increase in the number of people who attend its programs. About 80 people attend the center each day.

The number of programs also has grown and “it is increasingly routine for us to simply run out of space on the calendar,” Bradley wrote in a follow-up email.

In the same timeframe, there’s been a 17% increase in the number of home-delivered meals the center provides to residents in Hartford, North Hartland, Norwich and Thetford. This year, Bradley said they expect to serve at least 10,000 in-person meals and more than 25,000 home-delivered meals.

“It’s hard to think of another community facility that gets this much use throughout the year,” Bradley said.

Laurel Pero, of White River Junction, goes to the Bugbee at least three times a week and is often there every day, she said.

“I think they should have an automatic door,” Pero, 87, said. “That’s what they really need.”

Georgianna Wilson, of White River Junction, agreed.

“It’s hard for people with walkers to hold the door open to get out or in,” Wilson said.

Paul Vanesse, of Wilder, said he’s has visited the Bugbee every weekday that it’s been open since March 2023.

“This is my family,” Vanesse said in an interview as he worked on a jigsaw puzzle after lunch last Thursday.

If a new building is built, Vanesse would like to see it be in generally the same location. The Bugbee Center is on the Advance Transit bus loop and is close to White River Junction VA Medical Center.

“It would be nice to have a bigger building with more room for more activities,” Vanesse said. “There’s a lot more people who might be able to come but they don’t because it’s so crowded.”

Haverstock hopes the committee will be able to deliver its recommendations in November when discussions about the 2026 town budget begin.

Liz Sauchelli can be reached at esauchelli@vnews.com or 603-727-3221.