A sign welcomes seniors back to the Douglas County Senior Center on Monday morning.
Photo by Kurt Hildebrand.
The Douglas County Senior Center has lunch ready for opening day.
Community Services Director Scott Morgan said he isn’t sure how many seniors will turn up during the opening days of the center.
“It’s a big day,” he told members of the Douglas County Senior Services Advisory Council on Monday. “It has been a really long, difficult, road for our seniors.”
Seniors will be required to wear a mask to enter the center, but may take it off to eat, drink or exercise.
“In order to stay open we have to require a mask,” he said. “We will be more delicate. People can wear whatever they want as long as abide by that. We’ll do whatever it takes to get this place open and keep it open.”
Morgan said the state’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration representatives have made four trips to the Gardnerville center and two to Kahle Center at Lake Tahoe.
“Many people have said they want to come back,” Morgan said. “‘It’s too important to us, we miss it very badly and we’re willing to suffer the consequences.’”
And he said there are others who are unwilling to take the chance and will stay away until they feel it’s safe.
He said key to opening the center is the number of seniors who have been vaccinated.
“We believe we’ve done a job superior to anyone in the state to get seniors vaccinated,” he said. “In the initial stages, those who wanted to get vaccinated, we put them at the front of the line. That has paid off for our seniors.”
Morgan said when Carson City Health and Human Services first opened up vaccinations, senior center employees started hitting the web site looking for shots.
