Campbell River is looking at becoming a more age-friendly community, one piece of fruit at a time.
On Monday, council authorized a staff recommendation, for the city to apply for the UBCM’s Age-Friendly Community Grant Fund.
In a report to council, planning technician Laura Walker said this would be “part of the city’s ongoing program of work in relation to creating an age-friendly community.”
The grant program can contribute up to 100 percent of the cost of eligible activities to a maximum of $25,000 for each eligible applicant under:
- Stream 1: Age-friendly Assessments, Action Plans & Planning, and
- $15,000 under Stream 2: Age-friendly projects.
If approved, the grant will go to the continuation of Greenways’ Fruit Tree Project in 2020.
The project connects fruit tree owners who don’t want to, or are unable to, harvest their trees with a group of volunteer fruit pickers.
In her report, Walker said that while the 2019 Fruit Tree Project Pilot did not specifically target seniors, it was found that many of the volunteers for the project were younger seniors, while older seniors with physical limitations were often the fruit tree owners.
The BC Conservation Officer Service referred several seniors who lived alone and had physical limitations to the Fruit Tree Project, in areas impacted by high levels of bear activity when they were unable to harvest their own fruit.
“This project, therefore, has excellent alignment with the aim and purpose of the UBCM Age-friendly Communities grant program, and has already been successfully piloted,” Walker added.
The city has until Jan. 17 to submit a grant application.
General manager of community development, Ron Bowles, said these grants usually have a “pretty quick turnaround for UBCM.”
Sixty percent of the fruit harvested from last year’s pilot project went back to community members in need and 40 percent went to other sources.
The UBCM Age-friendly Communities program assists communities in B.C. to support ageing populations by developing and implementing policies and plans, undertaking projects that enable seniors and elders to age in place, and facilitating the creation of age-friendly communities.
All local governments and First Nations in B.C. are eligible to apply to the Age-friendly Communities Program and can submit one application per intake.
Walker said many of the City of Campbell River’s policies support Campbell River being an age-friendly community.
A city survey for seniors in Campbell River in 2016 found that opportunities for social participation were rated as the third-highest priority area (after housing and health services) by the 572 survey respondents, 449 of whom were over 60.
Highlights from Greenways’ 2019 pilot project include:
- 77 people signed up as volunteer harvesters;
- 46 inquiries about harvesting were received from tree owners, 36 trees were harvested
- 1,438 kg of A-grade fruit was harvested (fruit for eating);
- An additional 442 kg of B- and C-grade fruit was also diverted from waste as a result of this project;
- 877 kg from this project donated to eight community partners (serving a total of 2,700+ people) for re-distribution, including: Campbell River & North Island Transition Society; Lighthouse Community Kitchen; Grassroots Kind Hearts Society; Campbell River Food Bank; Campbell River Head Injury Support Society; Mental Health Recovery Partners North Island; Campbell River Museum; and, the Carihi Secondary School Foods Class;
- 100% of volunteers, tree owners and community organizations that completed evaluation surveys want to participate in the program again next year; and
- a bear awareness workshop and Fruit Tree Project info session on Oct. 8, 2019 had 34-plus attendees.
