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Tough economic times are threatening to take an added toll on the elderly, with senior-assistance programs straining under tightening finances and the state eliminating the renters’ tax credit.   

The renters credit cut — which occurred when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed the Homeowner and Renter Assistance Program in the 2008-09 budget — will hit people like Sonora’s A.J. Holmes.

Holmes says she never thought during the 45 years she worked and paid taxes that losing just $347 a year could jeopardize her survival.

But Holmes — who is 67 and disabled — has an income of $890 per month, and pays $500 a month for her space in a mobile home park near Sonora.

“The extra $347 every year was a little windfall that could be used to buy food for the winter, fix little things around the house, and get a few little Christmas presents,” Holmes said.

Her financial plight is common among the elderly and disabled, said Area 12 Agency on Aging Executive Director Linda Zach.

Yet the renter’s credit cut is just the tip of the iceberg.

A budget deal being hashed out by the governor and state Legislature could cut $7.3 billion in funding for education, prisons, health care and benefits for the elderly poor and disabled. That’s on top of $11 billion in previous program cuts this year.

The Area 12 Agency is still smarting from the last round of cuts, when it had to reign in some of the services it provides to senior citizens in Alpine, Amador, Calaveras, Mariposa and Tuolumne counties.

Zach said everyone at Area 12 is working hard to maintain services, but they are holding their breaths.

Every cut eventually affects clients, she said, and many of them are already living on the edge.

For instance, Meals on Wheels, which is overseen by the county, has had to scale back.

“I used to get five hot lunches during the week and two frozen meals for the weekends,” Holmes said, “but they had to cut out the weekend meals.”

Zach said state funding for most of the agency’s programs has been cut by 10 percent or more.

While there haven’t been any actual layoffs, she said, they have not filled some positions.

“We are down to the equivalent of 14.7 full-time positions,” she said. “Three years ago, it was over 17.”

Zach said each of the five counties served by the agency provided additional funding this year to help maintain services.

Lynn Nolte, program manager for the Tuolumne County Department of Social Services, said the county has managed to avoid cutting her budget for in-home services so far.

“But it all depends on if there are further cuts from the state,” she said. “It’s a known fact that it is significantly less expensive to help people stay in their homes than to move them into long-term care, and they are happier at home.”

In the meantime, Holmes, who got her master’s degree so she could work as a psychiatric therapist to help the aged and disabled before she became disabled herself, is waiting and watching to see if the new administration will make a difference.

“Any culture that doesn’t treat the elderly with care and compassion is going down the tubes,” she said.