Greetings Villagers!

As we turn the calendar to the shortest month of this year, I'll take a moment to let you know why we are honoring the heart this month. And it is not only the obvious commercial answer: February 14th.

Did you know that since 1963 Congress has designated February as American Heart Month? It was nearly fifty years ago that it was recognized that heart disease was a major cause of the passing of too many people too soon. We are still challenged by this disease but now have much more information and guidelines about living a hearty and healthy life: good eating habits, physical activity/exercise, emotional connections, lowered stress, overall a balanced life.

Since we are newly engaged in revisiting our founding fathers' literary output I decided to join the trend and reread the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

To my surprise I couldn't find a single mention in either of these worthy documents of the inalienable right to a snack.

I was recently talking to a French friend about the increasing girth of America's citizenry and he asked with a mixture of exasperation and puzzlement: "Why are you always having le snack?! In France we do not snack, we sit down to properly cooked meals, which we take our time to eat and enjoy. Et voilà!" He sighed, "Of course that was before we were invaded by MacDonald's and Coca Cola!"

San Francisco Village offers many services covering a wide spectrum of needs – from health and wellness resources, to practical daily living assistance, to volunteer services. Please call the office so we can help you find exactly what you need.

The following are examples of some of the services we provided our members this past year.

• Computer assistance – SF Village provides free computer help to members.
• Food/meal delivery – SFV has a number of food and meal delivery providers to recommend.
• Home repair – The office has made many referrals for handy people to work on gutters, roofs, painting, plumbing, and so much more.
• Gardening – We have a number of gardeners in our data base.
• Transportation – If we can't arrange for a volunteer, we will pay for four drives to appointments annually starting in 2011.
• In-home assistance – We have helped a number of our members find the appropriate home care providers for post-op/post-rehab assistance in-home.
• Information related – Helped with health care directives, providing names of insurance providers.
• Friendly visits to members.

All our service providers are vetted which means that we follow a set procedure to ensure that they are qualified to go into our members' homes. The providers fill out our application form, provide us with references that are thoroughly checked, give us a copy of their business license and insurance coverage. After recommending a service provider, we follow up with members to determine their level of satisfaction.

February is punctuated in the public mind primarily by a day devoted to St. Valentine and all the gauzy, emotional elements of devotion associated with its observance. But it's also a month that calls attention to the importance of protecting something very solid; the vital organ that keeps us going - our heart. It is American Heart Month.

Given that heart disease is the number one cause of death in men and women - greater than the next five causes of death combined, there is every reason to be well informed on what can be done to protect against cardiovascular disease and promote healthy hearts. A number of easily accessible web sites can provide helpful information along these lines. Log onto http://www-healthy-heart-guide.com/, for instance, and one will discover a wide-ranging almanac of information on the subject. There is a section labeled "Five Ways to Lower Your Risk"; another maps out "A Healthy Heart Diet".

We are very excited to introduce SFV's three new board members – Jo Ann Madigan, Gloria Cavanaugh and Judy Langley. All three have exceptional experience and talents that will enhance the strength of the Village and make it even more relevant to all of our members. To read their bios, please click on their names.

Gloria Cavanaugh

"I’m excited about being part of an organization that is empowering adults to live and remain in their own homes as they age."

Jo Ann Madigan

"I'm honored to be a member of the San Francisco Village Board because I believe very deeply in the mission of aging in place. I hope that my many years of non-profit and health system experience will be of value to the organization."

Judy Langley

"I am delighted with SFV’s increased emphasis on services that will appeal to current and potential members and I look forward to helping in this effort."

Click here to read their bios.

It should be easy to write about the big heart of Glady Thacher because there's plenty of evidence that she has been pumping life and energy into her communities since she was very young. A pivotal figure in the founding of San Francisco Village, she has made her mark on many Bay Area organizations that may have started small - but blossomed into powerful tools for change under her guidance and inspiration. As she transitions from our Board of Directors to Advisory Board, we are extremely grateful for her 'recruiting" and numerous contributions.

Glady was born and raised in New York, attended Smith College, and envisioned a career as a fine artist until her plan was altered by marrying her lawyer-husband, Jim, and moving to San Francisco, where they would raise four children and become active volunteers and philanthropists.
"The odyssey of life is quite strange," she suggests reflectively. "We set off to do something that may not be the true path. If it's not productive and you give it up, you also give way to something that is truer in yourself. That was the case for me - a series of happenings that led me to serve on the board of a halfway house, the second in the nation."

(Reprinted from Vision Magazine, Winter 2010)

Innovations in our industry are usually what grab us, and aging in place is no exception. We see Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities (NORC) being created, well, naturally. It’s the ability to live in one’s own home for as long as comfortably and safely possible. We often ooh and ahh at the latest gadget, gizmo or revolutionary new bathtub design. But if innovation is simply the introduction of something new and shiny, then perhaps bringing old-fashioned community life back into our modern living environs deserves our attention. This was a main theme of CACM’s 2009 Northern California Expo, this is where our industry is headed.

Our path towards launching a first-of-its-kind partnership for aging in place began when a property manager received a phone call from a concerned adult daughter begging him to check in on her elderly mother. Mom was 86-years-old and lived alone. The daughter lived out of state. And for some reason, mom wasn’t answering her phone that night. So, could he please just knock on the door? Staff did check on the unit, and were relieved to find that mom was fine and that the phone had just been off the hook. But this scenario was one in an increasing volume of unusual calls related to older residents asking for services well outside the realm of commonly practiced property management expertise.