The City of Abbotsford has applied to officially be recognized as being friendly to older residents.
A report to council details the municipality’s efforts to gain official recognition as an Age-Friendly City from the provincial government and B.C. Healthy Communities, part of a World Health Organization project.
“An age-friendly community is where older adults are supported to live actively, and socially engaged,” the report says.
Abbotsford has done the following to gain recognition:
– established a working group in 2016, which meets monthly
– passed a resolution supporting age-friendly recognition
– published a survey to assess its friendliness to older adults in November 2016
– developed and published an action plan identifying key strategies to become more age-friendly
Abbotsford is home to 58,000 adults over age 45 – 41 per cent of its population. The outcome of the application is expected this month.