The City of Williams Lake, in partnership with Urban Matters and BC Healthy Communities, is embarking on a Seniors Home-Sharing Planning Project.
The project aims to better understand the senior population’s housing needs and preferences and explore a variety of non-traditional possibilities for meeting those housing needs within the community.
“We are inviting all senior citizens aged 65 plus within the City of Williams Lake to share their housing perspectives and needs by participating in a this newly-launched survey,” Mayor Surinderpal Rathor said. “We are looking for as much feedback as possible, and your input will help to shape the final recommendations of how we move forward with the home-sharing project.”
The City is currently facing housing challenges similar to other communities, and the home-sharing project seeks to identify and help address the widespread issue.
“Our aging and growing senior population is beginning to find it challenging to find suitable housing to be able to age in place,” Rathor said. “Through this project we hope to be able to help address that.”
The survey is available in both online and paper formats and should take approximately 10 minutes to complete.
All senior residents in the City are encouraged to participate in the survey, which can be taken online until February 11, 2023. Physical copies are available at the Seniors Activity Centre, the Cariboo Memorial Recreation Complex and at City Hall.
Moving forward, the City plans to host informal educational and focus group sessions to introduce a variety of age-friendly housing types and to gather more feedback from participants.
The online survey can be taken at the following link: https://www.surveymonkey.ca/r/WilliamsLakeSeniorHousingSurvey
This initiative is funded in part by the Age-friendly Communities Grant Program, which is funded by the Ministry of Health and delivered by BC Healthy Communities Society in partnership with the Ministry of Health.
Contacts:
Urban Matters
Anne Burrill, Social Health and Well-being Consultant
Phone: 778-376-2219
Email: anne.burrill@urbanmatters.ca
City of Williams Lake
Greg Sabatino, Events & Marketing Coordinator
Phone: 250-392-1770
Email: gsabatino@williamslake.ca