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Jul 17, 2006 5:35 pm US/Eastern
NJ Senior Citizens Find Ways To Beat The Heat
Bergen County, NJ
(CBS)
Jonathan Bonanno delivers food to senior citizens for Meals on Wheels but on a hot day like this...when no one answers the door at a house in Lyndhurst...he worries.
"That she's not on the floor," he says, thinking of every possible scenario, "hopefully, she's away on vacation somewhere and didn't tell the office, that's what I hope" says Boananno.
"Are you the deliveryman," asks an elderly lady, walking up the street.
"Yes," Bonanno answers.
It's Mary Valentine... the woman he has been looking for. The 96-year-old had been out shopping and shows up as Bonanno knocks on her door. Valentine invites us in but confides she doesn't always leave on the air conditioning.
"It's off and on, off and on," she says.
Jimmy Valentine knows his mom too well and constantly stops by. "All you have to do is leave it on and it'll work," Valentine says, frustrated that his mom doesn't listen. " He goes on to say, "..but they refuse to leave it on and I don't think it even has to do with money or anything, it's just they feel they're letting something go that shouldn't be going."
"I think it helps, with both of them on," Wanda Moschillo says. The 86-year-old Lyndhurst resident, who also relies on Meals on Wheels, doesn't take any chances during the scorching heat.
"Have you put your air conditioning on?" I ask her.
"I have one...that's all I have and it's in the living room...that's why I sleep on the couch," she says.
Bergen County has 12 senior centers and during heat waves those centers are designated "cooling centers."
That means anyone can go inside and cool off.
To find out more about Meals on Wheels and the senior centers in Bergen County, you can call the county's Division of Senior Services at (201) 336-7200.
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