The Wellesley Select Board this week invited members of the Council on Aging (COA) and its board to its meeting to discuss their requested FY26 budget (see Wellesley Media recording a little more than an hour in). The Select Board, in turn, is scheduled to present the COA budget to the Advisory Committee on Jan. 29, and then the motion for the budget appropriation at Town Meeting.

The discussion built on a Select Board budget summit with other departments held in December, and focused largely on Tolles Parsons Center kitchen-related operating costs. Plans to bring the kitchen into compliance with Health Department standards has been a huge topic of conversation at the COA for years and of late: Despite the Center having commercial-grade appliances from its start in 2017, the kitchen was not designed in such a way that the Board of Health could approve its use for serving large group meals, serving breakfast, hosting cooking classes, and more (the kitchen is currently restricted to heating lunch meals prepped and packaged offsite, with more involved catered events subject to one-day licenses—a Lunar New Year event is already on the schedule). Food-related events are a big part of socialization for patrons, said COA Board Chair Kathleen Vogel.

Tolles Parsons Center COA — Tolles Parsons Center

As for the Select Board, “Understanding the operational costs of any major capital expenditure is an absolutely standard request… is part of the Board’s responsibility…,” said Chair Colette Aufranc at the start of the budget discussion agenda item. She described the operating budget request, shown at just over $600K in a document attached to the Select Board meeting agenda, as being roughly flat, with a small expense increase related to kitchen costs.

As discussed recently at a COA Board meeting, the Council has no intention of hiring a chef or kitchen staff to serve meals, though has staff and volunteer personnel certified to support meal service in whatever form that takes (COA’s director and Wellesley’s health director addressed questions regarding logistics during the Select Board meeting). The COA may start charging patrons a nominal fee for some meals, but will also fund food service via subsidies and gifts.

The COA is partnering with the UMass Gerontology School on a needs assessment study that should help the Wellesley council get a better sense of what the community wants from it, and the role that the upgraded kitchen could play (see Wellesley Media recording of UMass Gerontology School presentation). The study will involve surveys and focus groups, and should result in a report by fall that the COA can use in creating a new strategic plan. The town will be looking to the COA for any possible requests that need to be accounted for in its forward-looking Town Wide Financial Plan.

What we do know is that the town’s Facilities Management Department is seeking $560K in its FY26 cash capital budget to cover kitchen construction, per FMD head Joe McDonough. The FMD leader said market conditions are looking favorable, and that plans are to put out a request for bids on construction in early February. If all goes well at Town Meeting, funds would be in hand mid-year and construction could be largely done by year-end.