Verona LIVE, an innovative community-based program staffed by a site coordinator from JFS, was recently featured in a national news story on aging in place.

VERONA, N.J. (AP) -- Retirement communities may have their perks, but Beryl O'Connor says it would be tough to match the birthday surprise she got in her own backyard when she turned 80 this year.

She was tending her garden when two little girls from next door -- "my buddies," she calls them -- brought her a strawberry shortcake. It underscored why she wants to stay put in the house that she and her husband, who died 18 years ago, purchased in the late 1970s.

"I couldn't just be around old people -- that's not my lifestyle," she said. "I'd go out of my mind."

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