Waxter Center for Senior Citizens will close temporarily by May; Where programs will go, possible reopening date still being determined

The Waxter Center for Senior Citizens, a Mount Vernon fixture that has provided programs and services for hundreds of area seniors for more than half a century, will close at least temporarily this spring while city officials decide how to address a malfunctioning air conditioning system and other building maintenance issues.

Decisions about when the building might reopen, or whether it will reopen at all, and where its programs will be relocated, are still being made, city officials said during a town hall meeting on Wednesday.

The closure affects a wide range of area residents because the building at 1000 Cathedral St. serves as a polling place at election time and a cooling station during the hot weather months, in addition to housing one of the city’s oldest, largest and busiest senior centers.

No city employees will lose their jobs as a result of the closing, according to Michelle Taylor, Commissioner of the city’s Health Department, which oversees the building. Also attending Wednesday’s three-hour meeting were Deputy Mayor Letitia Dzirasa; City Council members Jermaine Jones and Zac Blanchard, and representatives of several city agencies.

During the meeting, city officials announced plans for the closure and outlined steps they’re taking to address the building’s condition and make sure its programs continue. They described the steps as short-term, mid-term and long-term plans.

Speaking to more than 100 people gathered inside the building, Taylor cautioned that decisions about the building’s fate have not been made. She said a major reason city officials scheduled the meeting is that they wanted to hear from the Waxter Center’s users before making any final plans. She said this week’s town hall meeting is the first in a series of meetings that officials intend to hold with Waxter Center users to hear their concerns and ideas.

“We have called this town hall to talk openly about the Waxter Senior Center – what’s happening with it and what our plans are for programming and to hear directly from you,” Taylor said. “I know there is a lot of information running around and we want to be completely transparent about the facts, the options in front of us and the constraints that we are working with…This is a space for questions, ideas and honest feedback.”

Taylor and other city representatives said one of the only decisions that has been made so far is that the building has to close before the summer because its air conditioning system doesn’t work and the city can’t use it without a functioning air conditioning system.

“Here is the very high-level overview,” she said. “The HVAC [heating, ventilation and air conditioning] system at the Waxter Center has failed, and I know you all know that. This means it is no longer safe to hold programs here during the summer months. As such, we need to move programming out of the center before the summer months. We are committed to continuing to provide programming in a location that works for you. This is one of the main reasons we are here today, to find out where you would like to go for programming.”

Any repairs to the building “will take several years,” Taylor warned. “This is why we want to make sure that any temporary location…is one that not only works for you but is one that you actually want to attend…We not only want to know where you would like programming to be held but what kind of programming you would like to have.”

In a slide presentation shown to the audience, May was given as the month by which the city plans to close the building.

“The Waxter Center programming will need to relocate by May 2026 prior to the next Code Red season,” one slide read. “We want your input regarding the temporary relocation. Once a location is identified, we will provide advanced notice and transportation support.”

‘Informed decision-making’

Between now and May, Taylor said, officials will be making decisions about where to move programs and services that the Waxter Center provides. She said the city also plans to launch a feasibility study to assess the building’s condition and determine what improvements are needed before it can reopen. As part of the study, consultants will consider other options, including demolishing the building and replacing it with a new facility.

The city’s Department of General Services (DGS) conducts feasibility studies to validate safety concerns, understand the condition of a building’s mechanical systems; determine a project’s feasibility and establish the optimal design approach for a given project. As part of the studies they commission, planners ask consultants to recommend the most cost-effective course of action for the city to take.

The goals of the Waxter Center feasibility study, officials said, will be to 1) “determine the viability of potential facility improvements before major funding and design decisions are made,” 2) “evaluate the existing building conditions, the Senior Center’s program requirements and overall functional needs,” and 3) “identify improvement options and outline the advantages and disadvantages of each to support informed decision-making and future capital planning.”

Audience members were told that the Waxter Center feasibility study is expected to take six to 12 months to complete and cost $100,000 to $200,000. Taylor said the study hasn’t begun and the architectural and engineering consultants haven’t been hired. She said the health department will use funds from its budget to conduct the study.

Support and socialization for seniors

Named after former Judge Thomas J. S. Waxter Sr., the three-story, 50,000-square-foot building was constructed starting in 1971 and opened in 1974 and was one of the city’s first multi-purpose senior centers. Waxter (1898 to 1962) was a prominent Maryland leader in public welfare and juvenile justice, a champion for social reforms, and an advocate for the elderly. He served as the Director of the State Department of Public Welfare from 1953 until his death.

The Waxter Center was designed by architect Leo D’Aleo of Meyers, D’Aleo and Patton to provide support and socialization for seniors. For more than 50 years, seniors have come from around the region to take advantage of its programs, which range from arts and crafts classes and health care to meals and a therapeutic pool. In the audience on Wednesday were members who said they live as close as Mount Vernon and Bolton Hill and as far away as Parkville and Middle River.

During the presentation, DGS representative Carole Young said the building’s last major renovations included improvements in 2016 to the fire alarm system and upgrades to make restrooms, locker rooms and the pool area more accessible to people in wheelchairs, and an elevator modification in 2018.

She said a facility assessment in 2019 showed that the buildings HVAC system, which includes the chillers, boilers and cooling tower, is in need of repair, and that “the cooling aspect is our priority” at present. In addition, she said, the roof was last replaced in 2001 and the windows are “in dire need of replacement.”

Typical maintenance and repair requests in recent years, Young added, have concerned roof leaks; plumbing issues (leaking toilets and sinks, low water pressure); windows (trouble closing them and need to fix broken hardware); electrical issues (replacing lights and repairing outlets); elevator service calls and need for snow and trash removal.

Three options

After listing the building’s problems, city officials outlined three “outcomes and recommendations“ they expect from the feasibility study. They are:

Option 1: Renovate the existing building by upgrading critical systems and interior finishes.

Option 2: Include all elements of Option 1 plus interior alterations to reconfigure spaces to better support program activities.

Option 3: Demolish the existing building and construct a new, modern facility designed to meet current and future Senior Center program needs.

Officials noted that the three options “are preliminary and subject to change based on collaborative efforts between DGS, the Health Department and the Mayor’s Office.

Young and a second DGS representative warned that it would be difficult for the city to make repairs while Waxter Center continues operating inside the building.

“With the repairs that need to be done,” Young said, “it is recommended that the building be vacated so these repairs can be done, especially when we are dealing with roof replacement, HVAC system replacement, electrical upgrades, especially with structural repairs, anytime you are dealing with major environmental or hazardous material removal or when you’re just dealing with multiple system upgrades.”

Sometimes a building reaches a point where it’s already beyond its useful life, said DGS representative Marwan Alkarajat. “You can do patch repair, but that does not give you a long-term solution that we all can be proud of.”

In order to replace the HVAC system in the Waxter Center, Alkarajat told the members, “I have to take down the ceiling…Even the light fixtures. Everything in that ceiling has to come down in order to put in the distribution system. That’s why we believe it’s unsafe for the occupants to remain in this building during renovations. It’s unhealthy, against code, and it’s illegal to keep you in this building if there’s dust. We don’t know what materials [there are]. This is an old building. For your health and your safety, we have to get you out of the building and give the contractor the space, and the space to do it right.”

Strong reactions

Options for continuation of programs after April, the audience was told, include finding another location; participating in other senior centers; and joining other programs such as the YMCA and local recreation centers.

During a Q&A session, audience members expressed strong reactions to the information that was presented.

“Grandmother” Edna Williams questioned how the city allowed the building to get into such poor condition that it has to be closed. She said the Waxter family set aside funds that were supposed to be used to keep the building in good shape and questioned whether those funds have been used appropriately over the years.

“I would like to know why this building is in such negative repair when the city is responsible for the maintenance of their property,” she said. “Apparently somebody has been keeping the funding because this building has not been repaired…I think we need to have a criminal investigation of the funding that has not been applied to the care of this Waxter Center.”

Williams also wanted to know why there wasn’t a vegetarian option in the lunch that was served at the town hall meeting.

“I am a vegetarian and I have asked the Baltimore City Health Department for years to do a menu for vegetarians,” she said “I am not eating today because there is no menu in all of the Baltimore City senior centers to feed a vegetarian or a vegan.”

Patricia Bradley was worried by the talk about moving programs out of the building.

“What is the priority for the seniors in this program?” she asked. “This is Midtown. It’s very convenient for us, very accessible. Is it on your mind to preserve this building? Because the scary thing is, you’ll get us out of here, saying it’s temporary, and we will never come back…Why can’t we limitedly use the buildng while you’re doing your work?”

Waxter Center is historically significant as one of the first centers of its kind in the country, she noted.

“This is a historical concept as well as a building,” she said. “It was a vision…This was a model for the nation.”

Like Williams, Bradley asked what happened to the endowment that was supposeely set aside to help keep the building in good repair.

“There were some funds left by Mr. Waxter for the maintenance of this building,” she told Taylor. “We can’t get information about the interest that comes from it every year, who’s managing it and why we are given only a partial amount of it…The funds were left exclusively for this building. We need to hear that.”

Deputy health commissioner Byron Pugh said the department can look into what happened to the funds Waxter left.

Sarah Matthews said Waxter Center members want to know what’s really going on.

“As older adults, we are not crazy,” she said. “We may be older, but we also have doctorates. We have master degrees. So we would just like to be able to hear the truth…There aren’t enough older-adult senior centers in Baltimore City and this one, particularly, is central. Some of us live in Bolton Hill. Some of us live in East Baltimore. We know that there is an endowment for this building…We would like to know what are truly our options.”

Social isolation is a problem for seniors, and closing Waxter Center won’t be good for its members, she warned.

“One of the issues that we face as older adults is social isolation,” she said. “If we don’t have a place to come, to exercise, to eat healthy and to communicate with each other, we are going to go back in our homes and be socially isolated again. I’m asking respectfully for the new commissioner to be honest with us and tell us what our options are and make sure that we have some ownership in whatever you choose to do.”

Demolition concerns

Others said they suspect that city officials want to close Waxter Center so the city can sell the land to a developer. They noted that the building occupies a large parcel on the west side of Mount Vernon that may be attractive to developers. Several suggested that city officials have already decided to sell the building and just aren’t telling the users.  

Part of the concern about demolition comes from the fact that, more than a decade ago, a developer named Howard Chambers proposed to replace the Waxter Center with a 14-story apartment building. The project was evaluated by a series of city agencies, including the Baltimore Development Corp., but ultimately rejected by then-housing commissioner M. Jay Brodie.  

Another reason for concern about Option 3 is that the estimated cost of repairing the HVAC system has risen in recent years.

“The cost to upgrade the HVAC system at the Waxter Center has increased from the initial $4.3 million estimate to over $8.5 million, according to a more recent assessment,” planning department staffer Kristen Ahearn wrote to the Planning Commission in November of 2025. “The building has an FCI (Facility Condition Index) score of 69, which suggests it should be replaced. The deferred maintenance on the building is almost $15 million (for building systems only), and even with an HVAC replacement the building will continue to present a strain on the operating budget in the form of frequent and costly repairs.

‘Prime development site’

In her report to the planning commission, labeled “FYI 2025-2030 Capital Planning Improvement Recommendations,” Ahearn suggested that one option would be for the city to put the property out for bid with the requirement that developers include space for a replacement senior center in any project they propose to construct, the same way that a developer provided space for a new public library branch as part of the Hammond at Greenmount Park apartment building that recently opened at 1100 Greenmount Ave.

“DoP has identified this as a prime development site with an opportunity to issue an RFP (Request for Proposals) requiring a private developer to include a new senior center space in the building,” Ahearn wrote. “This would ensure that the seniors in the community will have access to a new and improved facility,” while also allowing for private development.

David Weisand, an artist and entrepreneur with three business within a block of the Waxter Center, said he’s leery of any talk about demolition.

“I am very suspicious that when we get to Option 3, which is the demo, that that is probably the plan all along,” he said at the meeting. “I am very active in the Mount Vernon Belvedere Association. I’ve been on the Architectural Review Committee. I have friends in Planning and I have friends in Baltimore Heritage. And everybody who I know out there is telling me that this building is just going to go away. If that’s true, this is a very uncomfortable conversation to have.“

Weisand said he remembers how Chambers pitched his plan to replace the Waxter Center with an apartment building 18 years ago.

“It says to me that this has been in play all this time,” he said.

Weisand added that he’s heard that the cost of repairing the air conditioning system was up to $8 million as of last summer.

“How many quotes did you all get?” he asked Alkarajet. “Eight million dollars to fix an HVAC system?”

Taylor, who has been health commissioner for six months, said it’s not true that city officials have already decided to tear down the Waxter Center and sell the land to a developer. She said the city will be guided by the recommendations from the feasibility study. She asked how much members of Waxter Center pushed back against the developer’s plan when it was first floated. “I wonder if folks made their voices heard 18 years ago,” she said.

Alkarajat declined to confirm the $8 million figure but said replacing the HVAC system requires other work that would have to be factored into the cost. At this point, he said, “Option 3 is the least attractive option at least for now, based on what we have. But again, we don’t know all the details and that’s why we’re going to have a team of architects and engineers evaluating the structure of the building, the mechanical systems, the plumbing, the landscaping, the flooring. Every system of this building will be evaluated as part of the study. We’re trying to make an educated decision here. I guarantee you that no one has made a decision about what option is going to be done.”

Alternative locations

Asked about a potential place to move Waxter Center programs, users said they would like it to be a location that is fully accessible to the disabled, well served by public transportion and, ideally, located in the same general area as the Waxter Center. Suggestions included property in the State Center office complex around Howard and Preston streets and the former Eutaw Marshburn Elementary School that recently closed in Bolton Hill. Others proposed modifying one of the city’s recreation centers to include more programs for seniors.

Rose Backus Hamm said the health department has suggested a privately-owned building in the 2800 block of Sisson Street that housed SquashWise, a non profit group that teaches public school students to play squash, before SquashWise’s recent move to the former Greyhound bus station on Howard Street. The building is owned by Seawall and falls within the footprint of its proposed Sisson East development. Backus Hamm said the Waxter Center users don’t want to go there because it’s not as large as the Waxter Center and is blocks away from the nearest bus stop, among other reasons.

Backus Hamm said she would prefer that the city make incremental repairs to the existing building rather than close it for major renovations and move programs. She suggested that the health department consider a fourth option: keep the building open during the morning in the summer, at least until the feasibility study is complete. She said the building could be cooled with fans in the morning, before the highest temperatures of the day, and then closed in the afternoon if necessary.

Backus Hamm and others also suggested that if air conditioning is the biggest problem, city officials might consider closing the Waxter Center in the summer and then reopening it in the fall and winter when the heating works and air conditioning isn’t an issue.

A group called the Waxter Warriors wore black and white t-shirts and passed out a flyer summing up their preferences:

“What Do We Want,” it read. “We want to REMAIN AT the Waxter Center Until A New Center Can Be Built on ANOTHER SITE.” In addition, “We want the air conditioning at our present site to be PATCHED to handle the building this summer…We want to be RESPECTED AS Seniors with OUR INPUT IN THE DEVELOPMENT of a NEW CENTER.” And finally, “We want to be able to have ACTIVITIES after 4:30 p.m. during the week and on SATURDAYS.”

‘We only have but so long’

One concern that numerous Waxter Center members expressed is the potential disruption to the routine they like now and the potential loss of the social network that the Waxter Center offers.

“I cannot do without the fellowship, the friendship and the community that we have,” said Becca Halloway. “This is my social family and I depend on it daily.”

Evelyn Colvin, who comes in from Middle River, wanted to know exactly how long it will take for city officials to make changes, once they decide on a plan of action.

“I really enjoy it here,” she said. “I understand it’s going to take awhile. The problem is, we’re old. We only have but so long. We want to be in our new building yesterday, and that’s really frustrating.”