4 May 2016
By Tom Collins
tom@TheCork.ie
Today at at 3pm Ann Doherty, Chief Executive of Cork City Council and Chair of the Cork Age Friendly City Alliance, an interagency group comprised of senior management from the statutory, voluntary, community and private sectors, will launch the Cork Age Friendly City Strategy 2016- 2020 at an event in the Millennium Hall City Hall, Cork.
This strategy is the result of a process which began when Cork City committed itself to Ireland’s national Age-Friendly Cities and Counties Programme. The World Health Organisation has defined an Age Friendly City as a place where more and more older people can stay living in their own homes and communities, lead healthy and active lives, get to where they want to go, when they want to go, and are valued contributors to the lives of their communities..
Among key overarching aims of the Cork Strategy are:
· To improve access to its services for older people. To do this agencies will ensure that all staff will deal with older people in an age appropriate manner.
· To promote and encourage the development of the Cork City Age Friendly Business Programme to promote better customer facing interactions.
· To seek to expand and increase levels of activity including volunteerism from middle age in keeping with the aims of Healthy Ireland, developing a flexible directory of services for older people that will provide up to date information.
· To look to the National Dementia Strategy (2014) to inform its policy in relation to the provision of dementia friendly services to older people with cognitive impairment.
Speaking in advance of the launch, Ann Doherty, Chair of the Cork Age Friendly City Alliance said:
“This strategy is the culmination of a detailed consultation process that has brought together the older residents of Cork and the key service providers from the statutory, voluntary, community and private sectors to identify how we can make Cork an excellent place in which to live, work, enjoy life and grow older. As an Alliance we have worked to ensure this strategy has set co-operative goals that are specific, measurable and realistic.”
