College Park residents listened to and spoke about issues related to growing old in the area at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church last night.

Citizens gathered in the Rector’s Lounge of the church off College Avenue next to Fraternity Row at 6:30 p.m. for a panel discussion about what kind of senior-living program residents would like to see established. The College Park Aging-in-Place Grass Roots Group organized the forum.

“The grassroots committee is really important for something like this,” said Carol Nezzo, one of the event organizers. “We need to have those services there when we need them, and we need to develop them ourselves.”

Mayor Andy Fellows moderated the discussion, attended by an audience of about 60 people, close to the room’s maximum capacity of 65. Among the speakers was District 2 Councilman P.J. Brennan, representing the City Council and its aging task force.

The City Council established the task force of city officials and residents last April to explore options for an aging-in-place program in the city. Since then, the committee has met every month for three months.

“The charge of the committee, which has representatives from the council and residents, is to identify the existing county and city resources,” Brennan said. “Communication is one of the biggest challenges — to just let people know what’s available to them.”

Brennan, who has lived in the city with his husband, Nick, for three years, emphasized his desire to live in College Park after retirement.

“When my husband and I moved here, we fell in love with College Park,” Brennan said. “I pray that we can stay in this city for as long as we can because we really do enjoy our community and everything around it.”

A similar task force was formed in Greenbelt in 1995 after the closing of the city’s nursing home, said guest speaker Christal Batey, a community resource advocate with the Greenbelt Assitance in Living Program.

“Citizens said, ‘What are we going to have for our residents that are growing older?’” Batey said.

The answer was that they wanted assisted-living programs to help seniors remain independent, rather than having to move into nursing homes.

“Our citizens wanted to stay at home — they wanted to age in place,” Batey said. “Out of that came the recommendation for a program that empowered our residents to remain independent for as long as possible.”

According to the 2010 Census, 5.1 percent of College Park’s residents are 65 years old or older. That’s less than half of the statewide 12.3 percent average.

This statistic is a sign of College Park’s unique senior population, which has different needs from other communities.

Eddie Rivas, who spoke on the panel, works at Vertical Village at Wildwood, an alternative community for seniors.

“The idea of a village and the way it’s defined on the website is that it’s a self-governing, grassroots, community-organized living space — usually geographically defined,” Rivas said. “It’s up to the individual village to decide whether to serve based on age or disability, but the important thing is they want to meet the needs of the residents.”

Among the Village’s most-requested services are help with chores around the home and rides to the grocery store or doctor’s office, Rivas said.

Those attending raised concerns such as an age limit on services provided and how to find out about resources offered.

Fellows said the university will be involved with developing a program for the city’s senior residents.

“The university is interested in helping out seniors,” Fellows said. “It’s really good for the university as well for retiring faculty staff and people who have an interest in the university if they’re able to remain in the community.”

CORRECTION: Due to a reporting error, College Park Councilman P.J. Brennan was incorrectly listed as a District 1 Councilman when it should have said District 2. Due to editing errors, a previous version of this story said the meeting was hosted by the city’s Aging in Place Task Force, but it was organized by the College Park Aging in Place Grass Roots Group. Also, Carol Nezzo is not a member of the task force. She was one of the main organizers of the event. This article has been updated.