The head of a western Massachusetts nonprofit is sounding the alarms over cuts affecting the region’s seniors, and is encouraging community leaders to step up.
For years, Hilltown CDC, a nonprofit community development corporation run out of Chesterfield, has worn multiple hats – supply housing, run a food pantry, secure grants for the region, says Executive Director Dave Christopolis.
Among its offerings: programs meant to care for the region’s aging population, whether it’s the Hilltown Elder Network providing in-home services or the Easy Ride van service, transporting seniors across rural Massachusetts.
That’s why when Christopolis and others saw cuts to Medicaid and other programs being floated in Washington, panic started to set in.
Gauging what to do, he found himself speaking with members of a senior housing program in Worthington, The Maples to get a consensus.
“I went to meet with them and their board of directors, who are all seniors, and they were like – “We don't know what to do, our tenants are asking us … can they write letters to their senator and we don't know what to tell them,’” he tells WAMC. “I went up and met with them and we talked and when I left that meeting, I was driving home, and I said “You know, I’ve got to do something here.”
Letter writing, as it turned out, felt like a good place to start. It led to Christopolis crafting his own letter, one that recently ran in the Berkshire Eagle and Daily Hampshire Gazette.
It was a sort of call to action, urging elected officials to do something while calling on local leaders and neighbors to work together, bracing for cuts that could have an outsized effect on the region’s many residents relying on social security, Medicare and other federal programs.
It also states “we will work together to raise the voices of our Hilltown seniors who are rightfully concerned about their livelihoods and ability to remain in the Hilltowns.”
Dated June 27, the letter would run as President Donald Trump signed the “Big Beautiful” legislation on July 4, which includes changes to Medicaid reimbursement.
For context, Hilltown CDC itself doesn’t rely on Medicaid dollars, but Christopolis says organizations like the Hilltown Community Health Center, do.
“A large percentage of the population in the Hilltowns are over 60 and … a lot [are] Medicaid recipients. A good portion of their patients are seniors with Medicaid,” he said. “It's a big part of the billing for that health center, which is a really important resource for everybody living up here.”
Christopolis says he’s looking to gather more support from community representatives and enter a new phase - forming a leadership group that, once banded together, could better help those living in the area.
“… and just try putting a little leadership team together to meet regularly through this administration and kind of help each other plan for the future,” he said. “Maybe combine our resources where we can, probably competitively apply for some grants together to try to find some private money to … fill what we imagine is going to be a pretty serious gap in what we typically see for funding.”
The reception’s been good, he says. Organizations like the West Cummington Congregational Church, Maple Senior Housing and the nonprofit It Takes a Village all signed onto the letter.
Christopolis says there’s hope that, with further organization, a unified voice for a region that’s often isolated could emerge. Many of the surrounding communities have populations in the low thousands, if not hundreds.
As a report by the Northern Hilltowns Consortium of Councils on Aging stated in 2024, many towns sport “Older Adult” populations that range from 36-48 percent.
All the while, Christopolis says, Hilltown CDC is keeping tabs on future cuts that could have significant effects on the organization. Potential cuts to the Department of Housing and Urban Development are mentioned in the letter. The Trump administration has also floated eliminating the Community Development Block Grant program in its recent budget request.
The program’s regularly provided around $1.3 million to Hilltown CDC - about a third of the CDC’s budget.
“It takes a good five months to apply, so it's very disruptive to not know what's going on, because we're trying to plan and we have to spend maybe $15-20,000 preparing this grant for the region, which I don't want to do if I'm not going to get it,” he said.
Last year, the grant that covers Chesterfield, Cummington, Goshen, Peru, Plainfield, Westhampton, Williamsburg and Worthington was slated for rehabilitating 11 housing units as well as for providing social services – “elder self- sufficiency” among it, according to the Healey administration.
Christopolis’s full letter can be found here.
