The 2014 Vancouver Sun United Way Day of Caring
Surrey Central City Target volunteers helped sort and pack bread at Deltassist’s north office. It kicked off the 2014 Day of Caring, which the United Way started in 2003. All that packed bread will assist Deltans in need. It is now going to; local seniors complexes, libraries, churches, ministry offices, employment offices, and alternative school programs.
A big thank you to; the Target volunteers, the weekly delivery volunteers, the local bakery who donates the baked goods and the United Way.
B.C.’s 1st Seniors Advocate
Isobel Mackenzie has been appointed as British Columbia’s (and Canada’s) first ever Seniors Advocate. She starts work, officially, March 31st, 2014
This new office will monitor senior services, promote awareness and work with seniors, families, policymakers, service providers, etc. to identify systemic issues and make recommendations on ways to improve care for our aging population.
Isobel will be using her couple of decades of experience, directly working with seniors and their situations, to represent the 700,000 strong B.C. senior population. She is looking forward to establishing a set of priorities and establishing a mandate in the upcoming weeks and months. It is expected that addressing the ‘complex needs of our seniors in B.C’ will compliment the existing B.C. system of supports, as well as provide information ‘to shape policy and provide supports to seniors’. The creation of this office is a solid step towards the governments Seniors Action Plan and Bill 10, the Seniors Advocate Act.
Ms Mackenzie helped grow Beacon Community Services from a small organization to B.C.’s largest not for profit community and senior organization with 1200 staff and 400 volunteers serving 7,000 seniors in Victoria. Their services included home support licensed care, assisted living, Meals on Wheels, independent housing assistance and many other volunteer services. Of particular note was the introduction of a new model of dementia care – Licensed Dementia Care – that has become a national best practice and helped Beacon Community Services to achieve the first certificate of recognition, setting a nationally recognized benchmark for worker safety in the delivery of community care. Ms Mackenzie also served as the B.C. Director of for the Canadian Home Care Association from 2007 to 2011 and contributed advocacy efforts leading to the first successful Work Safe BC Safety Audit for Home Care in Canada. Many additional roles on industry, government and union bodies further point to how she brings a well rounded background to the Seniors Advocate role.
We are glad to welcome Ms Mackenzie to this new role and are looking forward to her helping the seniors of Delta.
Vancity Steps Up and Helps Out
A big thank you to Vancity.
Vancity have provided $10,000 to Deltassist to help support low income families.
Vancity and the staff at Branch 19 also continue to make a real impact in our Delta community by working on the Bread Gleening program, with all the other volunteers every Wednesday providing fresh bread to many in Delta.
A great example corporate and staff commitment by stepin up to make Delta a better place.
Neighbours Helping Neighbours
Delta Firefighters Charitable Society gathered and donated $5000 to Deltassist for Christmas Programs in 2013.
Over the decades, year after year, the Delta Firefighters have been solid supporters, working to make Christmas a little better for Deltans facing challenges. From providing volunteer labour sorting toys for the Toy Depot, to helping with donations, they make the work for all the volunteers a little lighter and a lot more fun.
Delta Firefighters are one of many examples where reliable neighbours help neighbours – making Delta a better place to live.
Last year these Delta Fire Fighters, along with many others, helped the Deltassist Christmas Programs provide toys to 783 children as well as deliver 668 Christmas Meal Hampers to families, single parents and seniors in Delta.
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On November 30th, 2013 this years Christmas Artists Market again stepped forward with enthusiasm.
In 2012 the Delta Christmas Artists Market raised over $400 as well as a considerable amount of food.
Watershed Artworks Gallery Shop, the City of Delta and all the vendors at the market where cheerful supporters of Deltassist’s Christmas Programs. The unique items featured at the North Delta Recreation Centre event included pottery worms, stone artwork, ocean jewellery and exotic cookies yet the Deltassist Christmas Programs were featured front and centre to each person attending. The support they showed was both needed and appreciated.
Len Stroh Receives the 2013 Volunteer Service Award from the Delta Chamber of Commerce
Friday evening, Nov 15th, Len was recognized as 1st among the best for his volunteer work in Delta.
Len is Deltassist’s Treasurer and one of our hard working board members. He has already shown how he deserves this recognition and it is great to see others realize it as well.
Len Stroh has spent the last 4 decades helping Deltans through many Delta organizations. Len has just completed work with the Delta Heritage Advisory Commission and the Delta Museum on top of ongoing activities with the North Delta Terry Fox Run, North Delta Secondary School Dry Grads, Delta and Richmond Operation Red Nose, Delta Planning Advisory Commission, Delta Sport Council and the Delta Parks Recreation and Culture Commission. From coaching to working on committees and boards he has impacted and enhanced the lives or many Deltans.
Sharing Bread with Neighbours
Just sharing a loaf of bread seems like such an unassuming and simple event, not worthy of much mention. That is, until about 5 months ago when Deltassist received a call from a new bakery that had just moved to Delta.
Monte Cristo Bakery was looking to partner with a community service agency that could distribute their weekly bread overages; they wanted to make sure it would get to those who needed it. They found out that Deltassist was the go to social service agency in Delta so it sounded like we could help each other out. As we are involved in the Delta Food Coalition as well as a gleaning program it sounded like a good match for us as well.
The first time we went to pick up bread at Monte Cristo Bakery, they gave us 12 cases of artesian breads and cakes. Each case has at least 20 loaves of bread that needed to be put into individual freezer bags. We called a few of our trusty volunteers to help and got started. Every time we went for our weekly bread pick up, Monte Cristo gave us more cases of bread.
Monte Cristo’s generosity was overwhelming, and we quickly reached the point where we had more bread than clients that where coming in to our offices could use. We contacted 3 local senior’s apartments and made arrangements with the apartment managers to pick up bread for the tenants on a weekly basis.
We still had more bread, so we contacted the local libraries and they take a few cases each week.
We still had more bread, so we contacted a local church that has a monthly community dinner and offered them some.
By this time the word was spreading about Deltassist’s bread program and now we were getting requests from local agencies that work with low income residents about receiving bread. At last count we are distributing over 35 cases of bread per week.
This simple sharing in a loaf of bread has now grown to the point where we need more volunteers to help package and distribute the bread. A call goes out for volunteers and the very next week we have a room full of people to help with our new bread program.
We are looking at ways to share bread with Tsawwassen in the near future; volunteers to transport the bread are needed.
Deltassist would like to thank Monte Cristo Bakery for their generosity and community spirit as well as the caring volunteers that help us share this bread with the community.
Delta Seniors get a Bus
by R. Sultan, Minister of State for Seniors.
Recently, Mayor Lois Jackson of Delta drove me in her muscular pickup truck from one end of her vast community to the other, explaining why seniors need their own bus. Her advice echoed what I had already heard from seniors from one end of this province to the other; namely, yes, affordable housing is frequently a problem; and elder abuse certainly warrants action – and will get it – but the universal issue facing British Columbia seniors in this vast province is transportation.
Transportation problems can be severe for seniors living in spread-out communities with sketchy public transit, or rural areas without any public transit at all. Also, as the years roll by and ones cognitive capacities decline, your kindly family doctor may suggest it is time for you to surrender your driver’s license, and overnight, you are stranded. Or, you may have given your still-runs-just-fine Pontiac to your grandson and now live in some sort of communal arrangement where HandiDart is good but not so frequent. As backup, our provincial TaxiSaver program, which pays 50 per cent of taxi fares, is hugely popular – but has a monthly spending cap.
Seniors Bus to the rescue. In Delta, at least for now.
At a special event organized at a seniors centre at Delta, I was pleased to deliver a $20,000 cheque which will help Delta defray the $60,000 cost of a brand new “seniors bus.” This “age friendly grant” supplemented a $40,000 investment by the municipality, plus a spontaneous $1,000 cheque from a friendly senior who showed up for the ceremony. The Delta Seniors Bus has been procured.
The Corporation of Delta is one of 27 communities receiving a government “age friendly” grant for 2013. The purposes of these grants vary, community to community, and the winners are chosen in a non-partisan fashion by a committee of the Union of BC Municipalities. The focus is on proposals which will help B.C. seniors remain independent and involved in their communities, active and healthy. Isolation can be a killer for many seniors, and getting out of the house using services such as the Seniors Bus is one answer.
The Corporation of Delta Seniors Bus pilot program aims to provide seniors with accessible, affordable and reliable transportation options, facilitating access to seniors’ activity centres, shopping, medical services, banking and other community services. It is but one more transportation option for seniors who might otherwise be isolated or inactive.
Delta Mayor Lois Jackson is to be commended for implementing a service offering seniors improved and affordable transportation. The government’s “age-friendly grant” program is a partnership between the government of B.C. and the Union of British Columbia Municipalities; we put up the cash, and UBCM determines who gets it.
Creating Safety and Strategies for Change
From Elaine Greggain’s report on the Jan 20th, 2013 community cafe.
The meeting was very interesting and did acknowledge Deltassist’s support of this work.
Representation from all areas, including police and physicians, offered input that expanded the discussions about violence and allowed questions at each table. Many idea’s and options were shared.
A most interesting statistic was that 1 WOMAN IS ASSUALTED EVERY 17 MINUTES in Canada.
All were called on to make a difference by educating our young children that it is not okay to be put in situations that are sexually uncomfortable and for all types of religion to be involved with families.
What Families “Look Like” Today
Carol Matusicky, PhD, presented the following thoughts during a recent event at a local community centre.
My pre-occupation for over 35 years – viz., has been one of constantly observing and learning about children and families and how best to be proactive in addressing the changes taking place in families.
What families “look like” today, how and when they form, what they do, how they feel about the challenges they face, are, in many ways, far different from the experiences of previous generations.
The picture that emerges for me regarding the challenges that today’s families face is captured in a quote from Margaret Mead that I heard many years ago. Here is what she said:
“We now expect a family to achieve alone what no other society has ever expected an individual to accomplish unaided. In effect, we call upon the individual family to do what a whole clan used to do.” (Margaret Mead)
I think it is one of the major challenges today – to rediscover that clan, to grow the sense of community and connectedness in our neighbourhoods for the children and families in our communities.
The very fact of engaging families is, in itself, a unique and respectful step to take. What will families with young children say when asked to identify ways to improve supports for them? I can’t predict but I know what I would say and what my adult kids with family responsibilities would say:
•More support for child care
— more spaces
— less expense
We now have compelling research that shows investment in the early years pays off over a life-time in terms of health and well-being; success at school; a greater chance of attending post-secondary education.
PAY NOW OR PAY LATER.
•More flexible workplaces
— workplaces that understand that we don’t live the way we used to so we can’t work the way we used to. Workplaces that understand, for example, the increased caregiving responsibilities that families have – not just for their own children but, increasingly for aging family members. Flexible workplaces are good for the bottom line; they are workplaces in which employees are more;
…Engaged
…Committed and loyal
…Productive
…Free from turnover and absenteeism
•More recognition of the responsibilities that parents have – and I’m talking about many people parenting children today: mothers, fathers, adoptive parents, foster parents and, increasingly grandparents – thousands of whom have taken on a parenting role. More support is needed for this 24/7 role. “If a community values its children, it must cherish their parents.” (Bowlby, 1951).
5 Tips to Avoid Holiday Conflict with Family Members
This is a reblog of a post in the “Workplace Violence Blog” on Nov. 20th, 2012.
“Are you dreading one more holiday with your extended family? You already know that your Mom is going to badger you about why you aren’t married yet? Or, that your mother in-law will treat you like you aren’t good enough for her son? Or maybe it’s Uncle Bill and his awful comments because he has had too much to drink. Everyone has their family issues and conflict stories….you aren’t alone.
Here are a few tips to get through the holidays without engaging in arguments and conflict.
1. Be Prepared for Some Conflict
If you usually have conflict when you get together with your family, it’s a good idea to be prepared for it. Approach the situation with a sense of realism. If your mother always criticizes your appearance or your sister is argumentative, don’t expect them to change their habits. Prepare yourself ahead of time by teaching yourself to stay NEUTRAL and avoid taking their comments personally.
2. Accept the Reality of Who People Really Are
When dealing with difficult people, don’t attempt to change the other person. You will only get into a power struggle that causes defensiveness and invites criticism. The only person we can change is ourselves so if you display good behaviour, others may well follow your lead. Besides, you will also teach the younger generation how to behave in similar situations.
3. Keep Conversations Neutral
Avoid discussing divisive and personal issues, like religion and politics, or other issues that tend to cause conflict. If the other person tries to engage you in a discussion that will probably become an argument, change the subject or leave the room. Change your response to the other person and you will change the dynamic of the relationship.
4. Pick Your Battles
When potential conflict appears, we get to decide whether we will “let it go” or whether we need to deal with it immediately. In most instances our emotional side wants to deal with the issue immediately, but I urge you to step back for a few seconds before engaging. Take time to decide if you really need to have this family battle right NOW. If possible have the difficult conversation with a family member at a later time. Abusive behaviour should not be tolerated at any time so do your part to keep things from neutral to positive. Should someone become abusive to you, draw boundaries and if it continues then you know it is time to leave no matter what other family members say.
5. Know Your Limits
It is okay to limit your time around family members who make you want to pull your hair out or upset you so much that you want to scream at them. Know your realistic limits and be sure to stick to them so that they don’t get on your nerves so much that you end up starting conflict. It is okay to only spend 2 or 3 hours with the family rather than a whole day.
You can even set up a signal or keyword with a trusted family member when you need to be “rescued.” This can be extremely handy when you are stuck in a conversation with a confrontational or relative that is hitting all your buttons. Your family member can run interference before the conversation turns ugly.
Establish realistic expectations whether you are hosting the holiday get together or visiting someone else’s home. Be mindful of the family dynamics and be proactive about how you are going to deal with potential issues.
And most important, BE GRATEFUL! Make a list of each family member who will attend and beside their name write down one or two reasons why you are grateful to have them in your life. Gratitude has a positive impact on your emotional health and it reduces stress. Gratitude will create a different mindset and context for your family holiday.”
