This year, those members will celebrate their 70th birthdays and the tail-end boomers will begin to move into their mid-50s.

As the baby boomers age, senior centers across the nation are rolling up their sleeves and preparing for a demographic vastly different from the previous generation.

Renton Senior Activity Center is already seeing a shift in their patrons’ preferences and interests.

“The clientele has changed in their mindset,” said the center’s Recreation Coordinator Debbie Little in reference to the incoming baby boomers. “When I first started, people would come here at 9 o’clock and most of them would stay all day. They would have an activity in the morning, they’d stay for lunch, they’d stay for another activity in the afternoon – a lot of them were basically here all day. Now, people will come in, take a class and they will leave. They’re more discerning in how they spend their time.”

The center’s efforts to cater to the boomers is evident in the types of classes that are now offered.

“We’re doing activities that are more high energy. We’re doing pickleball, ping pong, we’re having speakers that appeal to pre-retirement,” said Little.

However, the center still suffers from the stigma of being a ‘senior’ center. Little said they changed the name from Renton Senior Center to Renton Senior Activity Center to relay to the public that the center is not a retirement home, rather a community center for people age 50 and above.

“We’re also looking at more of the 45 plus instead of 50,” she said. “We’re trying to get them in the door so that when they do retire, they don’t have that typical mindset about the senior center… like they play bingo and that’s it. That’s not what we do at all.”

According to Recreation Supervisor Shawn Daly, this battle isn’t a new one.

“We’re still battling with the same problem we had 30 years ago with people feeling like they’re not old enough to come to the senior center,” said Daly.

The center has also made strides to keep up with today’s digital frenzy, a trend that the boomers actively participate in. Along with the hard copies that are distributed city-wide, brochures are now digitized and accessible on computers, tablets and smartphones.

“[We’re] very progressive. Other senior centers aren’t doing that because they don’t think their population is accessing it that way,” said Little. “When we look at the analytics of it, I’m surprised that so many people are on it. It started out that most of them were looking at it on their desktops. Now most of them are seeing it on their phones, just like the younger generation.”

The fact that so many of the boomers are engaging in the digital content isn’t surprising. A 2016 study showed that 76 percent of the older boomers (ages 60-69) and 83 percent of the younger boomers (ages 52-59) are internet users. About 87 percent of the older boomers and 91 percent of the younger boomers own a cell phone, out of which 46 percent of the older boomers and 59 percent of the younger boomers are smartphone users.

While the center has made considerable strides to welcome the incoming class of baby boomers, they are careful to pay attention to the preceding generation, a demographic that, according to Little and Daly, relies heavily on the center.

“The people who really need us are the older adults,” said Daly. “We can’t forget that. Thirty years ago, the 60- to 70-year-olds really needed us. They don’t really need us anymore. Now the ones that really need us are 75- to 80-years-old.”

“I think we strive for that balance [of catering to both demographics],” said Little. “I don’t think we’re there yet. That’s what we strive to do. We are continuing to work towards that.”

“There’s always going to be a need for a senior center,” said Daly. “There’s always going to be people who need us. What’s happened is that those people who need us aren’t the 60 or 70 year olds; they’re the 70, 80, 90 year olds. So we’re always going to need the programs — the chair exercise classes, the nutrition program — if we’re going to survive. It’s great to incorporate to do stuff for the younger people, but they can take us or leave us.”