THE HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENT COMMITTEE

Members of the Health Committee joined forces with the Environmental Committee to become the Health and Environmental Committee with an expanded and interrelated focus on senior and environmental health issues.

The Health Committee had been inactive and resumed meeting this year. The new committee will review its Terms of Reference; it will set priorities for health and environmental issues affecting seniors; it will assign member responsibilities for those issues; and it will look at the role of advisory committees for key issues. The Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care is setting out a ten-year plan with an Aging at Home Strategy. It will be critical that CPC Ontario Division members be well-informed, knowledgeable and in a position to provide constructive criticism and suggested improvements or changes as this strategy is put together.

If interested in joining this committee, please contact the CPC office.

THE ECONOMIC CONCERNS COMMITTEE

We submitted a Pre-Budget Brief to the Provincial Government, a copy of which you will find on our website. We have learned that if we want to appear in person to present the Brief we will need to appear outside Toronto so that will be in our plans for the coming fall. We are targeting the issue of poverty this year and are planning a forum for the fall. We will be responding to the Provincial Plan when it is released this June.

THE MEMBERSHIP COMMITTEE

The committee designed and edited the text and layout for the new brochure. The committee is working on a strategy to promote the organization more widely in the province and to enlist new members.

THE RESEARCH COMMITTEE

During the past year, in association with the Housing Committee, research activity has continued as a follow-up to the Simcoe County project on rural homelessness. This proposed project on rural homelessness will concentrate on work with our partners in four neighbouring rural counties including Simcoe County. Its aim is to develop a knowledge bank with an interactive system for the use of local organizations and policy activists among Ontario communities with regard to homelessness. This is important in order to counter a divided interest and an unclear sense of responsibility between the three levels of government on housing issues. We hope the project will serve as a model information and advocacy network among Ontario communities and become an effective means of policy change.

We are in touch with individuals and organizations in the four counties, with the support of Fay Martin in Haliburton, Judy Muzzi and other associates. We expect to draw on past research into homelessness in the area, followed by the collection of census data, if it is available, for comparison of ages, incomes, and housing circumstances. Action taken with regard to affordable housing will be relevant but not the sole concern.

We intend to approach college students as partners along with seniors and workers in organizations, in order to create the necessary knowledge network. Working together will enable us to address problems, to identify issues affecting housing the homeless, and to advocate for change. Our aim is not only to promote action on affordable housing but also access to good health care, adequate income, transportation, and social inclusiveness in the local communities.

In conclusion, this project is intended to begin with exploratory research, and through the creation of information networks, lead to sound policy recommendations affecting the homeless, and successful action in rural areas. We are on edge as this ambitious project depends on funding.

Another activity of the Ontario Division and National CPC has been a proposal with partners to fund a major New Horizons project on elder abuse. The high level of funding makes this very competitive. We are patiently awaiting the outcome. In the meantime, we welcome your ideas about other topics for research.

The Mandate of the Housing Committee states that, in agreement with the Mission Statement of CPC (Ontario Division), the Committee seeks to ensure the well-being of all Canadians by promoting housing policies, legislation and services that respond to their needs.

1. To work with CPC National to urge the federal, provincial and municipal governments to re-establish a national housing policy and to resume their responsibility for building social housing.
2. To address a broad range of concerns related to housing including affordability, availability, accessibility, special needs care and safety.
3. To build a knowledge base from primary and secondary sources, quantitative and qualitative, on the housing needs of older adults.
4. To collaborate with other organizations concerned about housing including all levels of government.
5. To prepare and publish written material and offer educational workshops about the diverse housing needs of older adults.
6. To promote the development and extension of supportive housing programs and community support services that enable older adults to age in place.
7. To encourage and support organizations which are developing affordable housing projects for all low-income groups.

This has continued to be an active year for the Housing Committee. It has had six meetings during the year. The meetings and activities have been guided by the revised Mandate above which was finalized and passed by the Board at its meeting June 18, 2007.

At the last annual meeting it was stated that the final report of the research project, Holding on to Housing: A Participatory Inquiry into Homelessness among Older People in Rural Areas of Simcoe County, had been submitted to the New Horizons for Seniors, Social Development Canada, in May 2006. We were most fortunate in having the co-operation and experience of our partners¹ in doing the work required in a project of this nature.

The follow-up to the research study activities led to reflection on the process used and the experiences that came out of the study that would be useful in developing future directions for the committee It was noted how the partnership had assisted in planning and executing the project and all this was related to the Mandate. Planning the next steps for the activities of the Housing Committee were begun.

As a result of information gathered in our research it is evident that there is little interaction among rural communities regarding homelessness resources and initiatives and a lack of awareness of who is involved in problem solving on this very important issue. The Housing Committee began to explore the possibility of developing a network system. The proposal is to form a province-wide network of individuals and organizations that are working on or concerned about homelessness in rural areas.

This would be an intergenerational network whose purpose would be to share information and encourage local efforts to ameliorate homelessness in rural areas of the province through research and information-sharing. A sub-committee of the Housing Committee was established to work on developing the project. The sub-committee established contact with four regions interested in developing a network project. A conference call was set up with representatives in Simcoe, Haliburton, Peterborough Counties and the City of Kawartha Lakes. The call resulted in sharing of information and experiences related to each region and created interest in continuing the exploration of developing the project. As Committee Chair, I want to express my thanks to the members of the Committee (Don Bellamy, Joan Berndt, Bea Levis, Christine Mounsteven, Dorothy Rivers-Moore, Malcolm Stewart and Margaret Watson). I also want to thank Fay Martin (Haliburton County), Nancy Smith (Simcoe County), Judy Muzzi (City of Kawartha Lakes), and John Bennett (Peterborough County) for joining with us in the network project.

"Change is part of our human experience. It is important for us as humans to know that there is more to life than our immediate state of being. All effective programs for life need a focus on change if we wish them to lead to quality of life, and three areas need to be addressed: the program services themselves, the effective management of those services, and change, or new beginnings. All three aspects are necessary." ²