Whom to Contact

To talk with someone knowledgable about services and health care available in the Capital Area:

• Contact your local Office for the Aging
• Contact your Independent Living Center
• Consult your family doctor

Also check our list of toll free Hot Lines or search our Care Directory for provider contacts.

The regional 2-1-1 human services information and referral system will soon be operational in the capital area. As soon as it is running it should be everyone's first resource for information.

Use the New York Relay Center for calls between Text Telephone (TTY) and regular voice telephone users.

New York Relay Center

When a Text Telephone (TTY) user and a voice telephone user want to call each other, they make the call through the New York Relay Center. Communications assistants at the Relay Center "relay" the messages or conversation between the TTY user and the voice user.

For those unfamiliar with a TTY device, it looks like a small typewriter with rubber cups above the keyboard to seat a standard telephone hand set (the older kind with round ear and mouth pieces). It has a small one-line screen for displaying messages and a paper tape for printing them.

The TTY device enables deaf or speech impaired individuals to type messages which are sent over the phone to a receiving TTY, and to receive typed messages sent from another TTY. The TTY user can communicate directly with other TTY users and can either send or receive calls to voice users via the Relay Center. The communications assistants at the Relay Center verbalize TTY messages for voice users, and type in voice messages for TTY users.

This service is confidential and available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The Relay Center handles calls throughout the country for New York State and is free of charge. Users pay only for the cost of the call if any.

Persons who use a TTY may contact regular voice telephone users by calling the New York Relay Center at 1-800-662-1220.

Regular voice telephone users may contact persons who use a TTY by calling the New York Relay Center at 1-800-421-1220.

Independent Living Centers

The Centers serving the 11 county Capital Area are listed by the counties they serve. For Centers in other areas of New York State see the NYS Independent Living Centers Directory or contact the The New York State Commission on Quality of Care and Advocacy for Persons with Disabilities at www.cqcapd.state.ny.us

Directory of New York State Independent Living Centers

Albany Center

Catskill Center

Glens Falls Centers

Saratoga satellite office

Troy Centers

Hudson ILC / Troy Satellite

Offices for the Aging

Each of the Capital Area's counties is served by a county office or department for the aging. These county agencies are listed below. For local offices in other areas of New York State see the Directory of Local Offices for the Aging or contact the New York State Office for the Aging (online or E-Mail; by phone in Albany at 518-474-4425 or the Senior Citizens' Hot Line at 800-342-9871; or by mail at 2 Empire State Plaza, Albany, N.Y., 12223).