Stephen Shaughnessy has been hired as executive director of the Sedgwick County Department on Aging and Disabilities and the Central Plains Area Agency on Aging. The post has been vacant since longtime director Annette Graham’s retirement in December. CPAAA, which is administered by the county, also works with aging departments in Butler and Harvey counties.
Shaughnessy has spent most of his career working for nonprofit organizations focused on human services.
“I fell in love with the work — the mission of supporting people to live the life they want to live,” he said.
Shaughnessy grew up in Topeka, where his father worked for city and county government and his mother raised money for nonprofit organizations. He earned a bachelor’s degree in political science and government from Benedictine College in Atchinson and a master’s degree in public administration from Wichita State University. While studying at WSU, he started work at KETCH as director of employment and day services for the nonprofit, which serves adults with disabilities.
After eight years at KETCH, Shaughnessy moved to the Denver area and worked for several nonprofits. He worked as executive director at Mosaic, which serves people with intellectual and developmental disabilities; director of life skills and a veterans housing program at Rocky Mountain Human Services, which provides a wide range of services to children, adults and veterans; and chief services officer at Imagine!, which also serves people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
The Sedgwick County aging and disabilities department has about 73 employees and a budget this year of $20.6 million. About 70 percent of its budget is used serving older residents, with the rest split between people with intellectual and physical disabilities.
Shaughnessy said there’s “a fair amount of uncertainty” regarding future funding for services the department provides, much of which comes from the federal government. According to news reports, President Trump has proposed keeping funding level for the Older Americans Act but wants to reduce the size of the Department of Health and Human Services, which administers it.
“We’re just not sure at this point what the impact is going to be,” Shaughnessy said. “I try to view the challenge as an opportunity.”
In addition to services the department provides directly, it will spend over $13 million this year contracting with other entities to provide nutrition programs, community-based and in-home services, transportation and services to people with developmental and physical disabilities. (CPAAA has used some OAA money to help fund The Active Age since the newspaper began in 1979). If funding is disrupted, the agency will have to find “more creative ways we can work together” to continue serving its clients, Shaughnessy said.
“We’re here to serve them, and we want to make sure their needs are met.”
Shaughnessy said he and his husband, Jason, decided to return to Wichita after 13 years to be able to spend more time with friends and family, noting the lower cost of living as another plus. “And I don’t miss the traffic at all,” he said. They enjoy spending time outdoors and cheering the Kansas City Chiefs, and they visited Wichita frequently while living in Colorado.
“I feel like Wichita has come so far as a city in the last 13 years.”
