Age-friendly BC Video Transcript

Part 1 - Introduction

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Office
International Council on Active Aging

Hi -- my name's Colin Milner, and I'm the founder and CEO (chief executive officer) of the International Council on Active Aging.

What makes a community age-friendly?

The World Health Organization asked seniors around the world and they said an age-friendly community has pleasant, clean and secure public spaces. Seniors have accessible transportation. They can choose from a variety of affordable housing without having to move to a different community. They have employment and volunteer opportunities, and information and services tailored to their needs. And perhaps most importantly, they are respected and active participants in community life.

Communities all over British Columbia are working to create those conditions.

There are a lot of things that individuals and local governments and others can do and, as you will see from the successful activities in communities around the province, it doesn't have to cost a lot.

We hope these actions will inspire others involved in community development to make their own communities more age-friendly.

Communities the world over are aging. Some may see this as a challenge, but many are embracing the opportunities that come from a healthy, active older population.

Seniors are a valuable resource and they have experienced an unprecedented period of global growth and innovation.

The Baby Boomers, who were born between 1946 and 1964, have been changing the way we live, work, play and think for 65 years, and they're not about to stop as they move into their senior years. They are rethinking our concepts of retirement, assisted living, fitness, rehabilitation and wellness, and dispelling myths about aging.

Age‐friendly communities are emerging all around the province, and it's our pleasure to show you how they are improving the quality of everyone's life.

Part 2 - How BC Communities are Becoming Age-friendly

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Office
International Council on Active Aging

What can communities that have worked on becoming age-friendly tell us about how they did it? Collaboration with different groups is important, as is community sponsorship from both politicians and staff, as well as access to innovative and long-term funding.

Steve Meikle
Manager of Community Services
District of Saanich

Well, in order to build an age-friendly community I think it's important to involve seniors right from the get go to ensure that what we're doing, the plans we're making, the major changes we're making, are hitting the mark.

Jill Zacharias
Social Develop Coordinator
City of Revelstoke

In Revelstoke  here we did an age-friendly plan for Revelstoke and area which included really extensive community consultation. The older people were kind of feeling left behind, they were feeling a little left out a bit and just the community consultation process alone was very, very empowering for our senior population. It told them that they had a voice that people were listening to.

Steve Meikle
Manager of Community Services
District of Saanich

One of the things we find with age-friendly cities, or these kinds of initiatives, is it's rather short-lived. It often just has a life span that, you know, there's a build up, and then the report comes out and then it trickles away, and we've taken the approach of saying "we heard in the first place the needs of seniors were important. Let's look at ways of incorporating that into our everyday business". So as we do our annual planning each department will have a look at their major priorities and they're taking the feedback and the responses we've heard from seniors and incorporating that into their budget planning, their action planning for the next year, and their strategic planning for the longer term.
Andre Boel
Community Planner
District of Sechelt

It's very important to incorporate design guidelines policy and accessibility vision into an official community plan for example, or in design guidelines for development applications, because that's the way you incrementally get to where you want to be as a community. In our official community plan we condensed the accessibility vision to one of the main goals. The guidelines that can be handed out right now it gives me a sense that this community together we accomplished something.
Ken Klassen
Director of Finance
Village of Lumby

How you weather the political change of changing mayors and councils is that you have the policies you are trying to do in your official community plan so the administration can carry those policies for the next 15, 20 years as the case may be.

Jill Zacharias
Social Develop Coordinator
City of Revelstoke

One of the key things initially was that we were able to be successful in our grant applications. Through those you develop a relationship with your funding bodies. We've developed a relationship with the Seniors' Healthy Living Secretariat which I think has been very positive. But I think one of the key pieces is that we've really strengthened and been able to form new partnerships within the community itself in order to specifically act on recommendations and do project development for the benefit of the seniors in our community.

Ken Klassen
Director of Finance
Village of Lumby

To be a part of the change and transformation of the community has been rewarding. Because you can see where some of the projects you were involved in are good and are accepted and the people are appreciating and they want to be a part of it and I'm glad that I was able to be administratively involved to enable that to happen for our community.

Part 3 - Involving Seniors

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Office
International Council on Active Aging

Seniors say plan with us, not for us. They need to a way to have their voices heard and programs will be more successful if they're built based on their advice.
Steve Meikle
Manager of Community Services
District of Saanich

In order to get the ball rolling and to have seniors participate and be a part of the planning process, I really think you need to take the time and listen, number one, and be part of their community if you like. So it may be a group of seniors that are interested in a social or a recreational opportunity, and we don't need to, as a municipality, come in there and tell them what to do, but take the time to listen and figure out ways we might be able to help.

Jane Osborne
Survey Team Lead
Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society

We set out to make sure the voices of seniors on the North Shore are heard when politicians of all government ilk are planning services for seniors. We wanted them to be providing the services that seniors actually said they wanted.

Sue Jackel
Senior Activist
Sechelt

The survey was based on surveys that have been done in other communities to find out what the priorities of seniors are in that particular community. So it was a question of going around to where seniors were and explaining why it was important for them to take half an hour to answer a questionnaire.

Jane Osborne
Survey Team Lead
Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society

We wanted to hear from the seniors that play such an important role in our society but aren't comfortable with coming out and telling politicians what they want. It was a terrific experience because it took me to so many different places. Seniors of all, the full demographic, from recent immigrants who didn't have English and we needed to use translators in order to communicate and get the information from them.

Sheila Gilmour
Board Member
Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society

We've always realized that we need information to back up the things that we say are necessary when we meet with politicians, or planners or whoever.

Jane Osborne
Survey Team Lead
Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society

I know from professionals in the field that to put 3,000 surveys out in the North Shore and get 1,200 back, especially a survey of the length that we did. It was not a short survey. We've hit a tremendous chord and for me personally that is very, very satisfying.

Sue Jackel
Senior Activist
Sechelt

We put the results out to the community. We put them up on websites; we took them to the council. Nobody in Sechelt now is ignorant of the fact that we have a high proportion of seniors and they have needs.

Judith Harrington
Survey Commmittee Member
Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society

Well I think it's essential to be proactive in your future - I think participating in this survey is the first step and then hopefully all the people who have participated will want to actually be active in making sure it's carried out. 

Rev. Gary Hamblin
St. John the Evangelist Anglican Church

Seniors have to become active. There's no two ways about it, otherwise decisions will be made by somebody sitting in a tower in some building in Victoria, or in Ottawa, or in the city hall for them.

Steve Meikle
Manager of Community Services
District of Saanich

I think they bring life experience. I think they bring the experience of seeing some things in the past that have been tried and maybe didn't work out so well and can give an opinion of how those things could look different in the future. And what we're finding with seniors is that they're more connected in the community than young people that might be newer to the community. You know it's building, again, building those relationships and building those connections throughout that we could, you know, ask one senior a question and it's going to trickle throughout the community, so we get that feedback building and kind of get the cauldron bubbling if you like.

Jane Osborne
Survey Team Lead
Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society

We  don't realize, the huge assets, the strengths, the knowledge, the skills that seniors have;  the things that they want to bring to community. They want to be active in their own futures -- they have a lot to give and we're not capitalizing on it yet, so that's really where we want to go.

Part 4 - Transportation

Colin Milner
Chief Executiver Officer
International Council on Active Aging

Accessible and affordable transportation plays a critical role in keeping seniors connected and getting them to the places they need to be.  Adding age-friendly features to ongoing projects, such as repairing or building curbs and developing bus stops, or working with BC Transit to improve services, are simple ways that communities are making public services more accessible. Where public transit isn't an option, BC communities have developed creative programs for volunteer drivers and programs such as wheels --to-meals.  Ideally, locating and designing services so they're central and accessible on foot or by bike opens up connections for everyone.

Andre Boel
Community Planner
District of Sechelt

It's very important to incorporate design guidelines and vision statements into policy documents, bylaws of a town to make sure that everybody knows about what's the goal for a community to move towards—in this case, accessibility, adaptability.

Cal Bowles
Sunshine Coast Transit System
Sechelt

I recommend any community or all communities to try to look down the road 10, 15, 20 years and see what population base you're going to be serving.  We did that and found that there's going to be a lot of seniors in this area, and we're making the steps now to be a step ahead of them. Most shelters you'll see in different transit areas are the glass/aluminum shelters that are very expensive to put in. We went to local suppliers, got local product, and we had the community high school programs install the shelters for us. Another program that we've implemented as well has been Saturday service for our HandiDart customers. We're implementing an ambassador program in the near future, so we're going to get people that would typically take the HandiDart and introduce them to transit with travel ambassadors to help them for their initial usage of transit.

Sonny Pedersen
Volunteer driver
Revelstoke

In Revelstoke there's two days that they have a bus service that goes to either Kamloops to the specialist or to Kelowna to the specialist. So any other day except Tuesday or Wednesday going to Kamloops or Kelowna, you have to have somebody that can turn around and take you there or help you there. Taxis would be $300. In the volunteer driver program, the people that we drive there, if they can afford something, they help. If they can't afford it, we turn around and cover the cost. We drive them there.

Jim Hemstock
Manager, Transportation
District of Saanich

In the District of Saanich, we have adopted the principle of universal design. The idea is that we design for everybody. Design it for stairs, that's fine for some; design it with a ramp, that's better; design it flat and it's easier for everyone. There's lots of things that can be done. We rebuilt all of the ramps along Shelbourne Street. You can hear the signal light chirp when it's your turn to cross, we put count-down timers on the signals, so now it's easier for scooters, easier for people with walkers, wheelchairs.

Joanne Scanlan
Co-chair, Sechelt Accessibility Advisory Committee

The more we can do to make the city's infrastructure—our sidewalks, our signal lights, our streets—easy to manoeuver and navigate, the healthier we're going to be as a community.  And, we also think that our changes that we've been making, things like more sidewalk cuts in the sidewalks and easier to read signals at busy intersections, are things that are going to help people of all ages.

Andre Boel
Community Planner
District of Sechelt

For all the planners in the programs that are interested in age-friendly planning, planning for accessibility, adaptability, I would say, start with local starting points, start with local needs—there might be a group that is asking for accessibility improvements, or maybe local builders have an interest, your council might have a special interest in these things—start with a starting point like that and reach out to the rest of the community and try to create partnerships. Figure out what is most needed in your community and make a plan and project out of that.

Part 5 - Housing

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Officer
International Council on Active Aging

Affordable, conveniently located, well-designed and secure housing is a top priority for age friendly communities - the key to aging in place. The social and psychological importance of being able to stay in the community cannot be overestimated. Ensuring an adequate supply of age-friendly housing options, located and designed so that services are accessible, is a goal that requires both the support of the private sector in close collaboration with public and not for profit housing providers and service agencies.

Anne Topp
Manager of Community Planning
District of Saanich

We became aware that our population was aging, that older people need help to enable them to stay in their own home longer. Adaptable housing guidelines in Saanich were designed to enable people to age in place, so they moved from a single family dwelling into an apartment building and then their needs change. We created requirements so that bathrooms would be bigger to accommodate a wheelchair. The area behind the bathtub requires backing so that grab bars can be placed on that without having to rebuild the bathroom. It makes it simple for people to stay in a place that is comfortable for them and to be closer to their friends and neighbours as they age.

This is called the Mount View site. We are developing in this site a combination of assisted living with the Coolaid Society managing Olympic Heights. We have family housing that's going to be managed with the Capital Regional District, there's an apartment building which is independent living for seniors and a four storey building fifty six units and then the piece de resistance I guess is going to be the new seven storey complex care facility which will be Mount View Heights and that will be managed and operated by the Baptist Housing Society.

James Slack
Senior Residential Support Worker
Victoria Coolaid Society

Well what we feel is, you know, having dealt with seniors for many, many years is that we feel that the best place for seniors is first of all is a safe environment, but also an environment that does not seclude them, that keeps them in an area where they feel part of a community. Therefore, you know, self- worth and those sorts of things, they are able to get out and volunteer, if need be, and we feel that's the best way to facilitate some growth for some of our seniors.

Eric Van Maren
Van Maren Group of Companies
Chilliwack

We partnered up with the city of Abbotsford to develop an affordable housing project called Harmony Housing. It consisted of 11 town homes for sale and each of those 11 town homes had a rental suite on the ground floor and it provides 11 suites for seniors or people with a disability at a very, very modest rent of under 400 dollars a month. The homes were sold at 24 percent below market value and there's a covenant on title now that if the current owner resells, he must also resell at 20 percent below market value which means that the homes will be affordable in perpetuity.

Brian Leckie
Sunshine Coast Lions
Housing Society

We have a very high population of seniors here on the Sunshine Coast, and affordable housing is really, really required. We're very short of supportive housing, very, very short of seniors housing and basically there's a need. This building is oversubscribed before it was even built and actually a hundred and two units, which is going to be the completion for this whole new project, is oversubscribed.

Darren Inkster
Former Mayor
District of Sechelt

The importance of working with groups like the Lions is they are a housing provider, so you need to work with those housing providers because we can't as municipalities build the housing and what we've done with them is we've forgiven development cost charges at the time of the building those are fees that are provided to municipality for parks, sidewalks, roads, water DCCs. We've looked at them and we've forgiven some of them initially to make the project less-expensive and then we've put in a plan to forgive taxes with the building for a number of years. Consequently, the building then looks like it can go forward in terms of a formula and then also the rental units are cheaper for the individuals using them.

Joyce MacLean
Resident, Mt. Begbie Villas
Revelstoke

I came out here at the end of March this year because my daughters had talked me into moving out and I knew these buildings were going to be available and I had already made an application. I count my blessings to think that at my age I've moved into a brand new building and I have nothing but praise.

Part 6 - Outdoor Spaces and Public Buildings

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Officer
International Council on Active Aging

Seniors need safe, dedicated and accessible outdoor spaces. The design of outdoor spaces can influence how people move around and connect with their community. Flat, well-lit paths, for example, can provide security and prevent falls and as people enjoy these spaces, they're also able to benefit from physical activity and social connections.

Muriel Armstrong
Stretch and Strength Class
Saanich

You name something you want to do and you can probably do it at Cordova Bay 55+. I come nearly every day of the week to do something.

Connie McKenzie
Stretch and Strength Class
Saanich

It's a great opportunity to come together with people. When I first started here, I was somewhat isolated by my brain injury -  and I was looking for an area where I could come that's close to home and get to easily, without depending on other people. So I came here and found a great group of people to interact with and share stories and - just socially it's just a very enriching place to come.

Muriel Armstrong
Stretch and Strength Class
Saanich

I feel very much the benefit of coming to this particular class because we start with aerobics, we use weights, we use stretchy bands and by the time you've finished you feel you've used every part of your body.

Scott Watson
Park Planning
City of Abbotsford

In Abbotsford, all of our parks are designed to be accessible to all. It's important that all people -all abilities - are included. We have this exercise circuit behind me, and it's to provide a place for not only the seniors to exercise, but also to socialize. Throughout this whole park you will find seniors walking, socializing, enjoying each other's company.

Harold Stanley
Planner, Community Planning
District of Saanich
Well we have quite a few seniors on the Shelbourne Valley action plan stakeholder's committee and they provided extremely valuable input with regards to what it's like being a senior in this area and getting around and a group of them actually, from the stakeholders' committee, did a special report that they did totally on their own about walkability in this area and they presented it to the District of Saanich and it's going to be an integral part of the Shelbourne Valley corridor action plan.  One of the obstacles of course is crossing major streets like this. If you've got a disability, or are using a walker, or you're in a wheelchair, the timing of being able to get across this street is a very important thing. There's no pedestrian refuge in this intersection for instance, which means that a pedestrian has to get across in the allotted time and if they can't do it, it creates problems for them as well as traffic.

Jim Hemstock
Manager, Transportation
District of Saanich

A few years ago we had the old style curb cuts which were quite small and steep. These are wheel chair ramps at the corners.  We actually had some people on scooters tip over. We rebuilt all of the ramps along Shelbourne Street so now it's easier for scooters, easier for people with walkers, wheelchairs. . . .

Pat Weatherbee
Operations Manager
Mr. Begbie Manor, Revelstoke

Because we have 43 seniors in this building, and they all use the front area of this building for one reason or the other -- a lot of them catch the bus and it snows just about every second of third day up here.  The ploughs come through and move the snow and it leaves a layer of ice. The City of Revelstoke put all of these grit boxes down, filled them with sand for us, and so the tenants, or myself, can come in in the morning and we can get a hold of this grit and they can do it themselves, or I can do it, it's self serve. It's a great thing and the city turns around and when they're empty we just call the city and they fill them up again so they're a great deal.

Part 7 - Community Support & Health Services

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Officer
International Council on Active Aging

Access to community support and health services is a hallmark of age-friendly communities. BC local governments and community organizations are key contributors, working in partnership with service providers.
Jill Zacharias
Social Development Coordinator
City of Revelstoke

I think within the medical field generally everybody is moving towards prevention identifying the social determinants of health.  So looking upstream measures that will keep people healthy in order to offset downstream medical costs and I'm talking about falls prevention, I'm talking about healthy eating,  healthy living.
Debbie Hertha
Seniors' Wellness Coordinator
City of Richmond

A lot of the programs that we try to implement into the community centres have a preventative measure to it.  So we're trying to educate people on ways that they can stay healthy at a younger age, let's say 55.  So when they go into their older years that they are definitely healthier and have more knowledge of the services and activities that are available to them. 
Charles Sze
Instructor, Luk Tung Kuen
City of Richmond 

Most of the Chinese people that are seniors do nothing in the home; so, they want to come out to the mall and to the community centre to do some exercise. 

Richard Wudrich
President
Lumby Curling Club

Our seniors are a really huge part of this program and this curling club.  These same people that are out behind me now which is the day time, also probably 30 -- 40 per cent come out during the week on a Monday night or Wednesday night and join other leagues.  Say we have a major bonspiel, they'll do the cooking and the kitchen clean up. Come time to make the ice there's usually five to six of them that come out and help us for three or four days to make the ice.  They participate in three or four other cities where they go and take two teams and curl and inter mingle then they can have them come back here and curl.  We try to use them to bring juniors up. They come Friday and help with the junior training and we have some middle-aged people that do the same with the seniors, they come out and help the seniors.

Diann Bastien
Whitevalley Community Resource Centre
Lumby

Through Whitevalley Community Resource Centre we offer services for seniors.  The day program over at Saddle Mountain Place is a Monday, Wednesday, Friday program that offers lunch and activities for the seniors in the community.  Complimentary programs through the resource centre, one is the handyman service, and we have a good morning program, which has a friendly phone call to seniors in the community who may be shut in.  If they need a CT scan or something that is not offered in the community, we can take them to Vernon to make sure they get there.

Chris Meade
Computer Instructor
Revelstoke

 I'm teaching a power point course at the Revelstoke Seniors Centre. About two years ago I took the course myself. I got really excited about this course - it was fun, it was something new, I was learning something, which is what I'm hoping to do with my students.  It's more than computer skills, it's learning, your mind is active, you're having fun, you're in a group, you're getting out of the house. 

Marlene Scarcelli
Computer Student
Revelstoke

I figure that anybody that's a senior should not be afraid of trying. They should try.  It's not hard.

Jill Zacharias
Social Development Coordinator
City of Revelstoke

One of the things that we did: We found in our seniors' survey was that - lot of seniors - there's fairly low uptake of programs and services, whether it be local, regional, or provincial, simply because people didn't know about them.  So, we created our seniors' resource guide so this is a local seniors' resource guide. It has information about everything that you could possibly provide assistance with locally as well as information on how to access provincial programs as well as information about who you can go to within our community to help you access those provincial or federal programs. So that was a small project that has gone a long way.

Part 8 - Employment & Volunteer Opportunities

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Officer
International Council on Active Aging

Seniors are often thought of as retired from working life, but many seniors have work experiences and skills that offer rich resources to their communities.  In an age-friendly community seniors have work and volunteer opportunities. Getting involved helps keep seniors active, healthy and aware of what their community offers.  And there is another bonus - when seniors are working or volunteering projects directed as fellow seniors, the results are more successful.
April Strothers
Consultant
Sechelt

So the way to keep people who are older adults or seniors healthy is to keep involvement up and that's physical involvement, social involvement, community involvement.  Not only working with people's interest but working with the intersections that don't always happen unless you are a bit deliberate about them.  So making sure that if people don't have family and don't have as many friends as they once had because they are aging, that there's other ways you can do intergenerational activities or other ways you can pull people together.
Debbie Hertha
Seniors' Wellness Coordinator
City of Richmond

People who are retired and willing to volunteer for different seniors organizations bring a lot of skills. So if somebody has a background in teaching painting for instance they could come and help other seniors and volunteer and contribute back to the community.
Leticha Yep
Community Centre Volunteer
City of Richmond

 I like to volunteer because I am retired and have nothing to do so I like to help people.

Victor Jacinto
Volunteer
City of Richmond

 Always seeing the happiness in their faces, gives us that sense of fulfilment of being a volunteer.

Andy Sidhu
Publisher, Punjabi Patrika
Abbotsford

Seniors come in with a whole of bunch of experience.  They have the knowledge depending on whatever their trade or business has been.  There are lots of seniors who work on the farms, there are others who work as security officers, and some of them go back to teaching.  I have a balance of 50/50 of seniors working for me and I am more than happy to work with the seniors.

Doug Smith
President
Sechelt Seniors Activity Centre

The seniors in this community from an economic stand point are the largest single revenue generator for the sunshine coast including of course, Sechelt. We are very proud of this centre in Sechelt.  These seniors, the core members of this association, financed and built this centre without any monies at all from government. So they borrowed it on their own and they built it on their own and we have 1290 members and we have 51 activities.  So we find it's a very active centre for the seniors in Sechelt.

Ruth Boettger
President
Revelstoke Senior Citizens' Association

Revelstoke Seniors Citizens' Association  is entirely volunteer.  The only person at all that is paid is our volunteer coordinator and she's paid by grant money.  Volunteers from this association, they do everything here, they organize the parties, they organize the workshops, they organize all the activities which is one of our major missions is to have a place where seniors can have their activities whether its pool, darts or cards; whatever they like to do.  We've gone out and asked our members what they want out of their centre.  It's their place, they have to run it, if they want it to go well, they start participating.  We've had more and more members step up to volunteer than ever did before. 

Irene Prosser
Newsletter co-founder
Saddle Mountain Place, Lumby

I'm the co-founder of our newsletter. After a few months of living here we decided nobody was corresponding or communicating or doing anything with anyone else.

Delores Pearson
Tenant Liaison
Saddle Mountain Place, Lumby
All the seniors acted much older than they were and this bothered me because I thought that I was going to move here and do things with the seniors. 

Irene Prosser
Newsletter co-founder
Saddle Mountain Place, Lumby

We now have a lot more people coming to the lounge because we try and put in all of the activities that we do, and the menus for the week, and wish everybody happy birthday for the month and those types of things. Everybody is encouraged to phone us and give us anything that they would like to see in the newsletter, just so that they're sharing in it. 

Delores Pearson
Tenant Liaison
Saddle Mountain Place, Lumby

Volunteering gets you into doing things, and once you help other people, you help yourself.

Part 9 - Social Participation

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Officer
International Council on Active Aging

Seniors have lived a multifaceted life.  They have a broad range of leisure, social, cultural and spiritual activities. Finding out what seniors want to participate in, and creating appropriate programs, requires inclusive planning by everyone from city planners to the seniors themselves. Active participation in the community contributes to quality of life, and healthy, active aging.

Jane Osborne
Survey Team Lead
Lionsview Seniors' Planning Society

I would say the key is, make sure that the seniors themselves are involved in helping you plan the project, that they're there guiding you all the way through. Don't think about the point in time. Think about 10 years out in the future and where you're going and what you're going to need in terms of relationships and ongoing input to get to that place.

Brenda deRoos
Treasurer, Cordova Bay 55+ Association
Saanich

The Cordova Bay 55+ Association provides a wealth of things for the seniors in Cordova Bay. It deals with the entire body, the mind, the brain, the social aspects.  Well, I think we've earned the right to do what we want. We don't want people providing programs for us. We like to choose what we want to do, and choose our instructors, adapt them to our needs. We really like to run our own programs. We're entirely, 100 per cent, volunteer, and we do what we want, when we want for the benefit of all the seniors. Having a seniors' facility in the elementary school is economically really wise.  It keeps the school open in the summer, in the evenings, after school and the intergenerational aspects of working with the children are really valuable for seniors and children.

Julie Pilon
Whitevalley Community Resource Centre
Lumby

The seniors have played an immense, big role in this garden.  They have built this whole area. The concept was their idea as to how it was going to be built, how high these beds were going to be built. They're gone out within the community and brought back resources. We had help from the high school in putting things together, as well as contributions from the village of Lumby and other people within the village.

Andy Sidhu,
Publisher, Punjabi Patrika
Abbotsford

One of the things that most municipalities should do is have a sort of a clubhouse or a meeting place for seniors where they could gather either to sit down and play cards, or just pop in, have a cup of coffee, so that they can communicate and chat with others who are of a similar age.

Gurmit Singh Tiwana
Retired College Lecturer
Abbotsford

Social cohesion is most important when you are aging and the only thing that is left with you is to converse with the age group in which you are. So it gives happiness, it gives them an ear  and you pass your time when it's difficult to pass your time at home.

Sonia Antranikian
Volunteer South Granville Seniors' Centre
Vancouver

I am an active member and a volunteer in the seniors' centre of Granville. It is interesting to meet people from other countries, because you learn about their country, their history and their traditions.

Deborah Brodie
South Granville Seniors' Centre
Vancouver

My brain is working, not only my body. I come here to dance, to make exercise, no? But besides that when you speak two languages, your brain works more. I like to study, I go to university, to sing, to study other subjects , no? To learn.

Dave Shepherd
Pickle Ball Player/Organizer
Abbotsford

Pickle Ball, itself, is a relatively new sport.  It's only in the last three or four years that it's become extremely popular.  Anyone can play it, and the games are as competitive as you want them to be. Once it's involved in a place, it's amazing how fast it grows.

Shirley Shepherd
Pickle Ball Player/Organizer
Abbotsford

The seniors come here to make friends with lots of new people and they just love to play with different people all the time, and they just meet lots of friends.

Dave Shepherd
Pickle Ball Player/Organizer
Abbotsford

We have terrific support from the City of Abbotsford and the recreation centre in arranging our own games within the framework of their times that they allot to us. We don't make them an awful lot of money but they are really contributing to the community by offering these facilities to the seniors that keep the seniors healthy.

Part 10 - Closing

Colin Milner
Chief Executive Office
International Council on Active Aging

The actions that communities take benefit all of us by recognizing the contributions that seniors have already made, meeting their needs today and receiving the benefits of their knowledge and experience.

By making our province more age-friendly, we're making it more friendly for everyone. The key requirements are open communication and a broad sharing of knowledge.

Local governments that have made progress can apply to be recognized and rewarded for their efforts.

For more information about how your community can benefit by becoming more age-friendly, and the tools to help you get started, please refer to the addresses at the end of this video.

• Age-friendly BC