At its best, our region is an ideal place to grow older, with robust services and welcoming communities to help New Yorkers age with dignity, joy, and independence. Nonprofits play a key role in supporting the more than 4.6 million older adults who call New York home and enrich its social, economic, and cultural vibrancy. Your gift to one of the groups below can help deliver meals, provide care, advocate for better policies, and keep older New Yorkers connected to their communities.
Advocating for Older Adults
LiveOn NY is a membership organization representing more than 100 nonprofits that serve older adults across New York State, from small single site senior centers to large multiservice agencies. It advocates for the funding and policies that aging services depend on, and its benefits outreach team helps older New Yorkers enroll in SNAP and other assistance programs.
Medicare Rights Center helps older adults and people with disabilities access the health care benefits to which they are entitled, and is one of the nation’s most trusted independent sources of Medicare information. Its free helpline answers thousands of questions each year on everything from enrollment decisions to appealing denied claims. Its counselors also help New Yorkers enroll in Medicare Savings Programs, which can save each individual up to $8,400 a year.
Release Aging People in Prison (RAPP) is a grassroots campaign led by formerly incarcerated people that works to end mass incarceration and promote racial justice by freeing older adults incarcerated in New York State prisons. It advocates for expanding the use of parole, compassionate release, and clemency, pointing to the evidence: People over 50 have among the lowest recidivism rates of any group. RAPP organizes directly with incarcerated people, their families, and communities across the state.
SAGE (Services and Advocacy for LGBTQ+ Elders) is the country’s oldest and largest organization dedicated to LGBTQ+ aging issues. It advocates nationally for policies that address the needs of LGBTQ+ older people and offers a variety of social and direct services. This includes operating affordable housing for LGBTQ+ older adults, such as Stonewall House in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, which SAGE opened in 2019 as the first program of its kind in New York State.
Care and Direct Services
CaringKind supports New Yorkers affected by Alzheimer’s Disease, from the first signs of memory loss through bereavement. Its free services include a helpline staffed by dementia specialists; support groups offered in English, Spanish, Mandarin, Cantonese, and Korean; family consultations and caregiver coaching, and a MedicAlert safety program for people who wander.
LONG ISLAND & NYC: India Home was founded in 2007 by South Asian health care professionals who struggled to find culturally appropriate care for their own aging parents. Today, it runs five older adult centers across Queens where South Asian and Indo-Caribbean elders find meals, yoga, mental health support, and help navigating benefits, all in their own languages. It also operates shared homes where seniors who need affordable housing can live together, and a dementia day program built around the cultures of the people it serves.
WESTCHESTER: Family Service Society of Yonkers’ Kinship Support Program supports grandparents (and other caregivers) who are raising children whose parents cannot care for them due to incarceration, drug addiction, absence, and other circumstances. Through case management, support groups, and financial aid, the program helps grandparents create nurturing homes, develop supportive and positive relationships, reduce the need for additional child welfare services, and receive the counseling and services they need.
Aging Creatively
Arts and Minds brings people living with dementia and their caregivers into museums for gallery conversations and hands-on art making, guided by trained teaching artists. Offered in English and Spanish at partner museums across the city and online, its programs create space for connection and creativity beyond the daily challenges of the disease.
Lifetime Arts is a national leader in creative aging, the evidence-based practice of combining arts education with social engagement to support healthy aging. It trains teaching artists, libraries, senior centers, and cultural organizations to bring high-quality arts programs to older adults in their own communities, and it works to make creative aging a standard part of how states and cities plan for their aging populations.
This list is not exhaustive. There are many incredible nonprofits helping make our region a better place for all; we seek to highlight a few that may not already be on your radar. Please reach out to our philanthropic advising department at advising@thenytrust.org if you are a donor seeking customized recommendations based on your charitable goals.
