BUCHANAN — Starting at 9 a.m. every morning, Buchanan resident Karli Wendorf picks up her phone and chats to a person on the other line about everything from her morning cup of coffee to the weather to a cute dog.

However, the Buchanan Area Senior Center employee is not just shooting the breeze. She is doing important work to ensure the welfare of area seniors through the center’s Compassionate Callers Club.

The Compassionate Callers Club is a free program where a homebound senior citizen will receive a scheduled daily call from a representative from the senior center.

The program partners with the Buchanan Police Department, so that if a senior enrolled in the program is unreachable by the senior center or the person’s emergency contact, the police will check on the senior.

Wendorf tailors the call to each senior, mapping out 30 minutes for each call, but allowing each senior to talk for however long they need.

“Sometimes people don’t like to talk too much, so they will just say ‘I’m fine. I’ll talk to you tomorrow,’” Wendorf said. “Others like to chat for a while and tell me about their day.”

Wendorf said she believes in the importance of the Compassionate Callers Club, because it offers homebound seniors, who are often isolated, an outlet to the outside world.

“If people don’t have someone to talk to, depression can set in and they can get really lonely,” Wendorf said. “We want to be able to provide people with something to look forward to. I want people to say, ‘I’ve got to get up early, because that’s when Karli is going to call me.’

Though the program is meant to benefit local seniors, Wendorf said that she finds working the program personally rewarding.

“I’ve been able to develop a relationship with these people, and we have gotten close,” she said. “I’ve have some really good conversations. It’s really interesting and neat.”

Currently, the program is only available to qualifying seniors in the city of Buchanan. However, the program soon hopes to expand its coverage to add Buchanan Township. Wendorf expects the expansion to take place within the next month.

“We currently have seven people using the program, but I have so many more leads for people, but they are in the township,” Wendorf said. “We really want to reach those people, and not have them be bound by geography, so we hope that we can [service Buchanan Township] soon.”

Wendorf said that the ultimate goal of the program will be to have 30 regular seniors enrolled. As Wendorf currently makes all the calls herself, adding more callers would require the program to take on volunteers, whom Wendorf said would need to be trained and vetted.

“[To make the calls], you need to be able to track things like speech patterns and moods,” Wendorf said. “I do that when I make calls, so I can know if they are talking slower than usual or are stuttering, which can be indicative of a problem. Then, I can call someone to check up on them.”

Despite the extra work that expansion will bring, Wendorf said that it will be worth it in order to help more area seniors.

“Here at the [senior] center, we work hard to ensure that we are helping everyone, not just the people who can physically make into the center,” she said. “I really think this program can help people. … I want to see it grow.”

People interested in enrolling in the Compassionate Callers Club can contact the Buchanan Area Senior Center at (269) 695-7119.