The North Ward Center
When COVID-19 hit Newark, Casa Israel — the North Ward Center‘s adult medical day program — watched many of its older adult and disabled clients disappear from its rolls. Even after the height of the pandemic passed, dozens of seniors remained homebound, isolated, and afraid to return to in-person care, leaving them cut off from the therapeutic programming and social connections they enjoyed at Casa Israel.
In 2023, HFNJ awarded the North Ward Center $225,000 over three years enhance programming and bring seniors back into the program. The grant was one of the Foundation’s first ones issued under a new multi-year funding pilot, designed to give grantees room for sustained, long-term program building rather than year-to-year funding that required annual renewals.
Through this project, staff fanned out to senior housing buildings and group homes with hands-on outreach events, hosted open houses and health fairs, and built formal referral relationships with hospitals and managed care organizations including RWJBarnabas Health, University Hospital, and several local physician practices. On the clinical and therapeutic side, the program introduced weekly Zumba and yoga classes, expanded on-site physical therapy to three sessions a week, launched “The Sharing Circle” peer support group, and started a monthly caregiver support group. All these programs were layered onto its core offering of nursing care, transportation, meals, and social services.
The results show a medical day program restored and strengthened. Casa Israel now serves 108 enrolled clients, having integrated 30 new participants in the grant’s final year alone. Behind the scenes, the center’s social services team logged some 140 client interactions in the final reporting year, helping seniors navigate everything from Medicare and SNAP enrollment to DMV appointments and housing paperwork.
As the North Ward Center looks to sustain the program through new grants and insurance partnerships, HFNJ’s investment has helped ensure that Newark’s older adults have a place to turn — one reconnected senior at a time.