She started a nonprofit in New York City in 1971 by asking stores if they would offer reduced prices for people 65 and over. Thousands of retailers said yes.
Maria E. Redo in 1975. She single-handedly convinced supermarkets, department stores, dry cleaners, restaurants and other retailers to offer discounts to older people. Credit...Robert Walker/The New York Times
In 1971, a tenacious activist named Maria E. Redo was walking in her Upper East Side neighborhood chatting with a friend about the many older people she knew who were struggling financially on fixed incomes, especially as inflation was taking hold.
“I said to her, ‘There’s got to be someone who is able to do something about it,’” Mrs. Redo (pronounced RAY-doe) said in an interview with The New York Times in 1975. “Then I left her waiting and I walked into a toy store.”
She told the manager that older people could not afford to pay for the gifts they wanted for their grandchildren as the holiday season neared. She asked if he would give them a discount. He agreed. The manager of the stationery store next door also said yes.
Within a few weeks, another 53 retailers had signed on, promising discounts of up to 20 percent to people 65 and over who showed their Medicare or half-fare transit cards.
Through the early 1980s, Mrs. Redo built the nonprofit Community Concern for Senior Citizens into a citywide force for securing bargains for older New Yorkers.
The decal for the nonprofit Community Concern for Senior Citizens, which was displayed at the entrances of stores that offered discounts to older people.Credit...Community Concern for Senior Citizens
As its unpaid director, she went door to door, signing up several thousand retailers, including supermarkets, department stores, dry cleaners, restaurants, beauty parlors, shoe repair shops and hardware stores. They indicated their participation by displaying a green-and-white decal — with a logo of two older people sitting under an umbrella on a park bench at their entrances.
“It is to seniors what the Diners Club and Visa logos are to businessmen,” she told The Times in 1981.
Mrs. Redo developed an affiliation with the Mayor’s Office for the Aging. She was praised in 1974 by the office’s director, Alice Brophy, who a year later would become commissioner of the upgraded Department for the Aging.
“Mrs. Redo has been more effective than a whole army of people in helping senior citizens — and she’s done it alone,” Ms. Brophy was quoted as saying in a syndicated column about government affairs.
A year later, Mrs. Redo received a certificate of appreciation from Mayor Abraham D. Beame.
Mrs. Redo, right, in 1975 when she received a certificate of appreciation from Mayor Abraham D. Beame of New York City.Credit...via Redo family
Mrs. Redo died on Aug. 11 at her summer home in Truro, Mass. She was 99.
Her son, Philip, confirmed the death.
Maria Elaine Lappano was born on Jan. 12, 1925, in Manhattan. Her father, Ernest, was a state assemblyman who later worked as an assistant Manhattan district attorney under Thomas E. Dewey and Frank Hogan. Her mother, Mary (Spicciato) Lappano, managed the home.
Maria graduated from Fordham University in 1945 with a bachelor’s degree in biology. While studying biology in a master’s program at Hunter College, she met her future husband, Frank Redo, a biology instructor who would become the chief of pediatric surgery at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center (now NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center). She and Dr. Redo married in 1948.
Mrs. Redo in 2005 with her husband, Frank, who was the chief of pediatric surgery at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center.Credit...via Redo Family
She returned to Hunter to earn a certificate in gerontology in 1980.
Mrs. Redo taught second grade at St. Margaret of Cortona School, a Roman Catholic elementary school in the Bronx, until Philip, her first child, was born in 1956. She later became active in her local community board and the Metropolitan Republican Club, where she served as president in the mid-1970s. She was an alternate delegate to the 1976 Republican National Convention in Kansas City, Mo.
At Community Concern for Senior Citizens, she relentlessly pursued discounts for older New Yorkers, with only a small administrative staff and an intern.
“She never had sales people — nobody represented her on the streets,” Philip Redo said.
In 1977, she persuaded Korvettes, the department store chain known for its bargain prices, to offer 10 percent senior discounts on Wednesdays at all 58 of its outlets.
David Brous, the president of Korvettes, told a news conference at the time, “Business has been slow to respond to the needs of the growing population of senior citizens even though they are a major factor in retailing today.”
Mrs. Redo called Korvettes “our type of store.”
Mrs. Redo in 1975. “If she saw injustice, she wanted to see it changed,” a colleague said.Credit...Tyrone Dukes/The New York Times
She left her discount program in the early 1980s after it was taken over by the city, her son said: “Her work as founder was done.” It soon morphed into the Silver Pages, a printed directory of discounts created by Southwestern Bell Media, the New York City Department for the Aging and similar agencies nationwide. It was published from 1985 to 1988 but was discontinued because Southwestern Bell felt it was not cost-effective.
In addition to her son, Ms. Redo is survived by a daughter, Martha Redo. Her husband died in 2006.
Mrs. Redo spent the last 40 years as a board member of the nonprofit Carter Burden Network in Manhattan, which provides services to older New Yorkers. Mr. Burden founded the network in 1971 when he was a member of the New York City Council.
“Maria’s passion for the aging remained undiminished until she died,” said William J. Dionne, executive director of the Burden network. “She was a pit bull, with her passion. She got things done. If she saw injustice, she wanted to see it changed.”
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